Commercial Geography / A Book for High Schools, Commercial Courses, and Business Colleges

by Jacques W. Redway

The refineries, as a rule, are built with reference to a minimum handling and transportation of the raw product. The cane-sugar refineries are mainly at the great seaports, where the raw sugar does not pay railway transportation. The beet-sugar refineries are in the midst of the beet-growing districts. So nearly perfect and economically managed are these processes, that raw sugar imported from Europe or from the West Indies, at a cost of from two and a quarter to two and a half cents per pound, is refined and sold at retail at about five cents.

The margin of profit is so very close, however, that in the United States, as well as most European states, the sugar industry is protected by government enactments. In the United States imported raw sugar pays a tariff in order to protect the cane-sugar industry of the Gulf coast and the beet-sugar grower of the Western States. The duty at the close of the nineteenth century was about 1.66 cents per pound; or, if the sugar came from a foreign country paying a bounty on sugar exported, an additional countervailing duty equal to the bounty was also charged.

In the various states of western Europe the beet-sugar industry is governed by a cartel or agreement among the states, which makes the whole business a gigantic combination arrayed against the tropical sugar interests. In general, the government of each state pays a bounty on every pound of beet-sugar exported. The real effect of the export bounty is about the same as the imposition of a tax on the sugar purchased for consumption at home.

Two-thirds of the entire sugar product are made from the beet, at an average cost of about 2.5 cents a pound. In the tropical islands the yield of cane-sugar per acre is about double that of beet-sugar and it is produced for about five dollars less per ton. This difference is in part offset by the fact that the raw cane-sugar must pay transportation for a long distance to the place of consumption, and in part by the government bounties paid on the beet product.

Both the political and the economic effects of beet sugar-making have been far-reaching. In Germany the agricultural interests of the country have been completely reorganized. The uncertain profits of cereal food-stuffs have given place to the sure profits of beet-sugar cultivation, with the result that the income of the Germans has been enormously increased. In the other lowland countries of western Europe the venture has been equally successful. Even the Netherlands has profited by it.

In the case of Spain, the result of beet-sugar cultivation was disastrous. The price of cane-sugar in Cuba and the Philippine Islands fell to such a low point that the islands could not pay the taxes imposed by the mother country. Instead of lowering the taxes and adjusting affairs to the changed conditions, the Spaniards drove the islands into rebellion, and the latter finally resulted in war with the United States, and the loss of the colonies. Great Britain wisely adjusted her colonial affairs to the changed conditions, but the British colonies suffered greatly from beet-sugar competition.

Production and Consumption.—The production and consumption of sugar increased about sevenfold during the latter half of the nineteenth century, the increase being due very largely to the decreased price. Thus, in 1850, white (loaf) sugar was a luxury, retailing at about twenty cents per pound; in 1870 the wholesale price of pure granulated sugar was fourteen cents; in 1902 it was not quite five cents.

Although the tropical countries are greatly handicapped by the political legislation of the European states, they cannot supply the amount of sugar required, unless the area of production be greatly extended. It is also certain that without governmental protection, sugar growing in the temperate zone cannot compete with that of the tropical countries.

Of the eight million tons of sugar yearly consumed, two-thirds are beet-sugar. The annual consumption per capita is about ninety pounds in Great Britain, seventy pounds in the United States, and not far from thirty-five pounds in Germany and France. In Russia and the eastern European countries it is less than fifteen pounds.

Molasses.—The molasses of commerce is the uncrystallizable sugar that is left in the vacuum pans at the close of the process of evaporation. The molasses formerly known as "sugar house" is a filthy product that nowadays is scarcely used, except in the manufacture of rum. The color of molasses is due mainly to the presence of "caramel" or half-charred sugar; it cannot be wholly removed by any ordinary clarifying process.