26 A2+ sugar

CHAPTER 1 The History of Sugar HAVE WE ALWAYS EATEN SUGAR? Today, people eat a lot of sugar. It is easy for most people to buy sweet things and to cook with sugar. It is part of our daily lives. But sugar has not always been so easy to get. 300 years ago it was unusual for people to have sugar. Where did sugar come from and what is its history? How has the sugar business changed the world? The first sugar cane grew on the island of New Guinea around 6000 BCE. Around 1000 BCE, sugar cane was brought in boats to India. People first chewed sugar cane because they knew that a very sweet juice came out. It tasted good!

People soon learned how to take the juice out of the cane. They cooked the cane in water, dried it, and were left with small pieces of sugar, called crystals. In the 8th century CE, Arabs brought sugar cane to Spain. When Columbus went to the West Indies for the second time, in 1493, he took a sugar cane plant with him. The weather there, with lots of sun and rain, was excellent for growing sugar cane.

The weather in the southern United States was also excellent for growing sugar cane. By the 18th century, farmers there were growing sugar cane on plantations. But sugar was expensive because making sugar from cane was not fast or easy. People used it as a spice, like cinnamon, curry, or ginger, not as a main ingredient. In 1879, in California, a new factory found a way to make sugar faster and cheaper. The plantation owners and the factory owners were making a lot of money because sugar was cheaper to make and people were buying a lot of it. Making sugar became an important business. By 1900, there were more than 30 sugar factories in the United States. Suddenly there was a lot more sugar in the shops.

In 1700, the average American ate less than two kilos of sugar a year. But as sugar became cheaper and easier to buy, people in Europe and the United States ate much more of it. They started to drink their tea and coffee sweetened with sugar. They started to eat more chocolate, jams, and candies made with sugar. By 1900, the average American ate over 30 kilos of sugar a year! Sugar has not only changed what people eat and drink. The big business of growing sugar cane and making sugar has also changed the history of several countries. Sometimes these changes have been good, and sometimes the changes have been very bad.

CHAPTER 2 The Colonies HOW THE EUROPEAN COLONIES CHANGED THE WORLD. As sugar became more popular, Europeans wanted to grow as much of it as possible and sell it in Europe. By the 17th century, there were many new sugar plantations in colonies all over the world. The island group of Hawaii in the Pacific Ocean is a good example of what happened in the colonies. Hawaii is an excellent place for growing sugar cane. When Captain Cook went to Hawaii in 1778, he was surprised to see native people growing sugar cane on small farms. In 1835, an American company started the first large sugar cane plantation in Hawaii. It made a lot of money so other American companies built plantations there also. In 1937, a factory to make refined sugar from the cane was built.

The sugar business changed Hawaii in many ways. The sugar companies took the best land for the plantations. They did not pay the workers very much money, and the hours of work were very long. Many people died from the hard work and new diseases. Life became very difficult for the native Hawaiians. Life became even worse after a law was passed in 1848. The law said that foreigners could buy land in Hawaii. By 1890, much of Hawaii belonged to foreigners. The sugar companies needed more workers, so they brought people to Hawaii from China, Japan, Korea, and other countries. Being a colony brought many problems to the people working on plantations in Hawaii and other places. But the worst problem was slavery.