Sugar

Abstract The dominance of colonial cane sugar on the world markets was increasingly threatened by European continental beet sugar. Advances in chemistry and agricultural technology allowed for beet mass production that was more efficient than labour-intensive cane sugar. However, based on empirical evidence, the chapter argues that there was significant overlap between the two spheres. The advent of beet processing had an immense modernizing effect on cane, and experts moved seamlessly between the two alternatives to explore the transferability of production methods, patents, and machinery. They also explored alternatives to cane and beet, such as sorghum. Sugar production in the nineteenth century was a complex landscape of shifting technologies and markets, driven by innovation that radiated across the world. German science and technology comprised a central node in that globalizing world. The country became a major exporter, first of beet sugar, and then increasingly of high-end, high-value technology.