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The Everglades Agricultural Area Environmental Protection District (EAA EPD), better known as simply the Everglades Agricultural Area (EAA), is an area extending south from
Lake Okeechobee Lake Okeechobee (), also known as Florida's Inland Sea, is the largest freshwater lake in the U.S. state of Florida. It is the tenth largest natural freshwater lake among the 50 states of the United States and the second-largest natural freshwat ...
to the northern levee of Water Conservation Area 3A, from its eastern boundary at the L-8 canal to the western boundary along the L-1, L-2, and L-3 levees. The EAA incorporates almost 3,000 square kilometers (1,158 square miles) of highly productive agricultural land. The EAA was established by the State Legislature as a special district representing landowners within the EAA Basin for the purposes of ensuring environmental protection. Means include conducting scientific research on environmental matters related to air and water and land management practices and implementing the financing, construction, and operation of works and facilities designed to prevent, control, abate or correct environmental problems and improve the environmental quality of air and water resources.


History

The Everglades Agricultural Area was designated by the Central and Southern Florida Project (C&SF Project) in 1948. The C&SF established 470,000 acres (1,900 km2) for the Everglades Agricultural Area—27 percent of the Everglades prior to development.


Sugar farming

Approximately 500,000 acres of the 700,000 acres of the EAA is controlled by sugar companies, namely
U.S. Sugar U.S. Sugar Corporation is a privately owned agricultural business based in Clewiston, Florida. The company farms over 230,000 acres of land in the counties of Hendry County, Florida, Hendry, Glades County, Florida, Glades, Martin County, Florid ...
and Florida Crystals. In late 2008, a land deal was in the works as U.S. Sugar offered to sell the US government just under 180,000 acres of land at $1.75 billion. The deal was repeatedly downsized until the
South Florida Water Management District The South Florida Water Management District (SFWMD) is a regional governmental district that oversees water resources from Orlando to the Florida Keys. The mission of the SFWMD is to manage and protect water resources by balancing and improving w ...
eventually rejected the deal in 2010.


Reservoir project

Three above ground reservoirs are being built by the South Florida Water Management District as part of the
Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan The Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan (CERP) is the plan enacted by the U.S. Congress for the restoration of the Everglades ecosystem in southern Florida. When originally authorized by the U.S. Congress in 2000, it was estimated that CERP ...
, including the A-1 parcel of the Everglades Agricultural Area. Construction of the reservoir was halted in 2009 during the negotiation of the failed U.S. Sugar land acquisition deal, after US taxpayers had already invested almost $250 million. In the summer of 2016, much of South Florida's waterways experienced massive toxic algae blooms caused by the discharge of billions of gallons of freshwater from Lake Okeechobee. Following the crisis, much public support was aroused pressuring the construction of the EAA to be moved ahead.


See also

* Draining and development of the Everglades § Everglades Agricultural Area * Everglades § Everglades Agricultural Area *
Everglades National Park Everglades National Park is an American national park that protects the southern twenty percent of the original Everglades in Florida. The park is the largest tropical wilderness in the United States and the largest wilderness of any kind east ...


References

Everglades
Everglades The Everglades is a natural region of tropical climate, tropical wetlands in the southern portion of the U.S. state of Florida, comprising the southern half of a large drainage basin within the Neotropical realm. The system begins near Orland ...
History of sugar 1948 establishments in Florida {{Florida-stub