SU(;AK I'KODIH TIOX I\ .MDZAMI'.lni'K. 20'/ 



Standing, speaking of the extraonlinarv fertility of ])arts of the 

 Inhambane district, said : 



Indeed so fertile is the soil in parts that at ]\hitaniba (the starting 

 point of the railway to Inharrime) there is a sitgar plantation so rich natur- 

 ally that it is never fertilised or even ploughed. 



his comment on this phenomena being: 



What would a Cuban or a Hawaiian sugar planter think of having no 

 ploughs, nor mules, nor oxen, on his estate, and yet having a good growth 

 of cane year after year? 



Mr. llarrett also spoke highl}- favourably regarding the 

 Zambesi area for sugar production, whilst, with reference to the 

 district of Ouelimane, he declared that it alone should yield an 

 export of more than half-a-million tons of sugar, leaving plenty 

 of ground for rice, beans, maize, fibre plants, etc. Concluding, 

 he gave the opinion that, along with sisal fibre, sugar-cane would 

 constitute the best paying crop throughout the Province as a 

 whole, whose natural fertilit}- he described as simplv amazing, 

 and in certain places unparalleled elsewhere. 



Mr. Barrett's successor as Director of Agriculture. Mr. 

 R. N. Lyne. F.L.S., now Director of Agriculture in Ceylon, 

 another prominent authority on tropical and sub-tropical agri- 

 culture, after speaking of the IVovince as the most favourably 

 conditioned, from an agricultural point of view, of any coiuitry 

 in South or East Africa — probably, indeed, in the whole conti- 

 nent — declared that sugar would certainly become one of the 

 leading crops, as the cost of jjroducing it compares favour- 

 ably with what obtains in Natal and Zululand. Indeed, he pre- 

 dicted an enormous expansion in the sugar producing industry 

 of the Province, particularly in the Zambesi and Chire areas, in 

 the Limpopo \'alley. and such like, declaring that its only limiting 

 factor would be the want of sufficient labour; and. hence, he 

 added, the adoption of labour-saving methods should be the first 

 care of capitalists. 



Yet despite this almost unique suitability of the Province 

 of Mozambique for sugar production on a large and 

 profitable scale, the sugar industry is of but recent 

 establishment. Indeed, up to the year 1890 the only sugar-cane 

 produced was that grown by Xatives for their own primitive 

 purposes, mainly for chewing directly. Even to-day, with an 

 output -in the neighbourhood of 30.000 tons annually, the produc- 

 tion is far below what might have been expected with sitch 

 favouring factors in operation, though in the near future that 

 amount will be very largely exceeded. Aloreover, until quite 

 recently, practically the whole of the output was limited to a 

 region in the Zambesi area measuring not more than one degree 

 in Latitude and not much more than two degrees in Longitude, 

 all comprised within a belt measuring not more than about 150 

 miles in length by 80 miles in breadth. Indeed, as late as 191 1, 

 over 21.000 tons out of a total of 27.500 tons for the entire 

 Province, were produced within this small area, abutting on the 



