273 



now a grant of £10,000 for the benefit of the sugar industry. It had 

 not yet been decided what would be done with the capital of the grant, 

 but the accumulated interest on the money amounted to a very fair 

 sum, and the Island Chemist had made proposals for utilizing that 

 fund. They were anxious to get to work to do so. In the first place 

 they had appointed a Fermentation Chemist who would travel 

 round the island and study distillation on various estates, but they 

 wanted to push forward their experimental cane cultivation where- 

 ever they could find estate proprietors willing to co-operate with 

 them and they would spend a little more money on that side of the 

 work. They also wanted to increase the cultivation of seedling canes 

 at Hope Gardens so that they might have a greater variety of canes 

 under different conditions in different parts of the island. Then 

 they proposed to extend the Laboratory at Hope so as to enable the 

 Island Chemist and the Fermentation Chemist to deal chemically with 

 samples from the estates If the planters thought there was any way 

 in which the Agricultural Department could co-operate with them on 

 their estates or elsewhere they should apply to the Board of Agricul- 

 ture. Another important question was that of the (.'anadian prefer- 

 ence. According to information given to Sir D. Morris and himself, 

 the whole of that preference was going into the pockets of the Cana- 

 dian sugar refiners, and although ( anada had received great credit for 

 working in the interests of the Empire, the preferental arrangeiaent 

 was simply being run for the benefit of a few sugar refiners in Halifax, 

 Montreal and elsewhere. The planleis in Jamaica should make such 

 arrangements as to secure their fair share of the preference. 



Mr, Gamble said seeing that Jamaica could produce good sugir, the 

 other point to be considered was the successful marketing of the sugar. 

 With regard to that Canadian preference he would just quote one in- 

 stance of a shipment He shipped one half of the produce to New 

 York and the other half to Halifax, and as a matter of fact the Hali- 

 fax shipment realized about 15 to 20 per cent more than the shipment 

 to New York, owing of course to the preference. This was a most re- 

 cent example. In that particular case they did get the preference and 

 as far as they could see it might be a most, difficult thing fo enforce by 

 any combination the paying to the the planters of this advantage. The 

 shipper had to use his knowledge as to what place was going to give 

 him the best return. In the past they had had some advantage and he 

 did not see why in the future they should not get it again. When 

 there was no advantage in Canada, the sugars in preference went to 

 New York. He should like to have heard there that day the prospects 

 of beet. The question was, what price could their great competitor, 

 beet sugar, be produced at to secure a profit? That was a point that re- 

 mained to be seen. His opinion was that at the present time when 

 they had to deal with a large proportion of beet sugar, cane sugar 

 would show its superiority and beet supplies would be reduced, but as 

 a matter of fact it was hard to find out what was the bottom price at 

 which beet, unsupported by bounties, could be produced. Since the 

 Brussels Convention they had already secured a veiy substantial ad- 

 vance in the price of sugar, There had been an advance of between 

 25 and JJU per cent in the value of sugar. Beet sugar was quoted as 

 low as 5s. 9d., per cwt. 



