16 



HISTORY OF SUGAR PRODUCTION IN NEGROS. 



According to R. Echaflz,^ the history of Negros as a sugar-producing country 

 practically begins with tlie year 1849, in which year the island, by command of 

 the Spanish governor-general, was placed under the jurisdiction of the religious 

 order of the Recoletos. The rapid development of the industry which at once 

 ensued and continued during the next forty years is attributed to the enthusiastic 

 and untiring efforts of this corporation, ably assisted by the then British vice- 

 consul, Nicholas Loney. Prior to 1849, some sugar was made in Negros, it is true, 

 but only in very small quantities and by the crudest methods, cane being crushed 

 in wooden mills, and the resulting juice boiled down to a sticky mass in small 

 iron kettles over an open fire and sent to the market in small bundles wrapped 

 in the whole leaf of the' buri palm. The island was at that time practically 

 unexplored and inhabited for the greater part by semibarbarous tribes of forest 

 people. The following figures are given as illustrating the progress made from 

 1850 to 1893. 



RECENT STATISTICS. 



During the period from 1893 to 1895 the sugar industry of Negros reached a 

 height of prosperity which it has never again attained. Since then it has suffered 

 so greatly from war and animal diseases that for a time it was practically para- 

 lyzed, and, although a sliglit tendency toward recovery was experienced shortly 

 after the period of greatest depression, the total production of the island has for 

 the past few years remained very nearly stationary, at a figure approximating 

 60 per cent of the maximum yield in 1893. The following data collected by the 

 Bureau of Internal Revenue for the ye.ar 1908 show by municipalities the area 

 of land actually cultivated in sugar, the area of growers' land adapted to such 

 cultivation but not so planted, the area of other land certified by municipal 

 councils as adapted to sugar culture but not planted because of lack of transporta- 

 tion facilities, animals, or capital, and the amount of sugar produced during that 

 year. 



'Apuntes de la Isla de Negros. Manila (1894), 11. 



