To give the reader a somewhat more definite idea of a sugar farm, a statement by Mr. P. M. Beal, of Beal & Co., lessees of the Colonia Guabairo, owned by Messrs. E. Atkins & Co., of Boston, possibly the largest American proprietors in Cuba, is herewith appended. Mr. Beal says:
“In 1889, when preparations for cane farming were commenced, the Guabairo was mostly impenetrable forest, and not a building of any kind existed; the working people slept under a cart until temporary palm-leaf huts could be constructed to shelter them. At this time the Guabairo proper contained 1333 acres; later some 1100 acres were hired or bought, and the colonia increased in area to about 2433 acres, of which in 1895, at the breaking out of the insurrection, 1100 acres were planted with cane and the rest was pasture, woods, and waste lands. In 1895, at the breaking out of the insurrection, the 1100 acres under cane cultivation produced about 2,500,000 arrobas (an arroba is twenty-five pounds), and aside from this, a sufficient quantity of corn and vegetables were grown for all the requirements of the colonia, so we never had to purchase. From the 1st of December to the 1st of June, an average of about 350 people were employed; of these ten per cent. were Canary Islanders or Spaniards, ten per cent. negro women and boys (white women do no field work); twenty per cent. native whites, and about sixty per cent. negroes and mulattoes. From the 1st of June to the 1st of December, an average of about 150 were employed. Women do no field work during this period.
“For agricultural purposes this colonia keeps nearly 300 oxen and about 20 horses and mules; also a few cows for milk, and a number of animals for beef, which in normal times varies from 30 to something over 100. In normal times this colonia slaughters on an average, about 22 animals per month, with an average dressed weight of about 200 kilos (450 pounds) per head. The cost for preparing, breaking up, cross-ploughing, marking, furrowing, seed cane, planting, cultivating, wear and tear to implements, and weeding one caballeria (33-1/3 acres) of cane to maturity, and do it well, is from $1400 to $1600, according to conditions of soil, wages, etc., and under normal conditions will here require from three to four years before the farmer can see any profits, and then only by intelligent management and good soil. Soil which requires planting every three to five years will ruin any man. The average yield of cane per caballeria in Guabairo for 1895 was about 71,500 arrobas, and the cost per 100 arrobas for weeding, cutting, carting, and delivering to the central amounted to about $1.84.”
The concluding passage of Mr. Beal’s statement indicates to some extent the effect of the war upon his plantation, which escaped happily as compared with hundreds of others. He says:
“In 1896 we had some new plantings, and the crop was estimated at 2,700,000 arrobas; very nearly the whole of this was burned by the insurgents, some of the fields were burned twice and no crop was made. The horses were seized, cattle driven off, storehouses plundered repeatedly, and finally the manager had to flee for his life and seek safety in Cienfuegos; since then the fields have suffered repeated burnings and the crop has been reduced from 2,700,000 arrobas to 1,400,000 arrobas, estimated. In 1897 and 1898 the crops were made under difficulties, the colonia employing a private armed force of sixteen men, and Colonel Luis Ramos Izquierdo kept a small garrison of his guerrillas in the colonia.”
Contrasting opinions as to the matter of profit in the production of sugar in Cuba, we present herewith two statements. The first is by Mr. William J. Clark, in his work, Commercial Cuba, and is as follows:
“We have already seen that Mr. Gollan, the British Consul-General at Havana, estimates the factory cost of sugar in Cuba at the best managed centrals to be 2.50 cents per pound, although in exceptional cases it may be less. But during the month of October, 1898, the selling price of raw centrifugal sugar, 96 degrees test, in the New York market has ranged between 2.40 and 2.60 cents per pound, neglecting United States import duty, which is a fixed rate of 1.685 cents per pound. If we take this selling price at 2.50 cents per pound, and deduct .22 cents per pound freight, wharfage, and commission, we get 2.28 cents as the price paid for raw sugar free on board at Cuban ports. From this amount must be taken export charges of five cents per 100 kilos lighterage at the port of shipment, and the cost of transportation from the central to the seaboard. These together sum up not less than .10 of one cent, which would leave the net price at the central 2.18 cents. But we have already shown that the factory cost of the product has been as low as 1.99 in Trinidad, 1.94 in British Guiana, and 1.86 in Barbadoes. These three costs give an average of 1.93 cents. Deducting from 2.18 cents which we have calculated as the present selling price at the central, 1.93 cents, the present possible minimum cost of production, we shall get .25 cents, equal to 12.95 per cent. as the margin of profit.”
Mr. Clark takes New York prices in October, 1898. These prices were not under normal conditions, the current prices of the year being 2-3/8 to 2½ cents for 96 centrifugals in bond. Mr. Clark gives cost of Muscovado sugars at the British islands of Trinidad and Barbadoes. These sugars test 89, and are worth seven cents less per pound in New York than 96 test centrifugals. He compares cost and values as if they were worth the same money. Properly compared, his profit changes into loss.
In this connection the following figures, especially prepared by an expert for this work, may be of interest:
| THEORETICAL SUGAR CONTENTS OF 100 POUNDS CANE | ||
| Bagasse (dry fibre) | 12 | pounds |
| Juice | 88 | “ |
| Total | 100 | “ |
| 88 pounds of juice containing 16 per cent. in sugar | 14 | “ |