I UK BUMB.U MAHKKI ornciNARUM 



Tnul 



- Indui.. iy long subsequently, from 



China. A >r twoago.th*peopl I . >-r fore, consumed a fur 



on i. in relatively of crude t- v do even to-day, 



iast India Company were * ; *<mtion ! 



nal trad. : the demands of Bombay were obviously the most natural Bombay an 

 outl.-r the surplus stork of Bengal, and the best check that could be important 

 to the Dutch trade in supplying Bombay with sugar. Hut to Market. 

 iiis. tin- transit due-, <>i. 



plaiv.i i the foreign supp. iia' n 



did not, however, assume contn.l of its owu market*. Large supplies 

 continued to be drawn from Egypt and China, as well as from Bataviu 



. and it was accordingly recognised that an flort must be made 

 to improve the cheaper Indian refined sugar, more es; uice still 



newer and more formidable producing centres had arisen in Mauritius and 

 the We>t Indies which began to contest in markets. And still 



:tl\ a disturbing element appeared in the supplies of cheap beet Bts<ir. 

 -Mired into India from Europ- <,- lost her 



European market but had become a field for European commercial enter* 

 prise in the provision of cheap refined sugar. But there has been secured at 

 least one advantage of this new supply, namely the vigorous education 

 of the people of India in the advantages of refined over crude sugar, luftacd 

 and thus the opening out of a large market of which the Indian refineries c 

 have recently not been averse to avail themselves, and may do so still 

 further in the future. It can thus be said that the people of India are 

 able to pay a far larger sum not for sugar alone but for many other luxuries, 

 than they ever did at any period of their past history. Further that 

 the home market, by far the most important to the producers in India, 

 is still largely secured to them. This is abundantly shown by the Finance 

 Minister of India (Gaz. of India Extraordinary, March 21, 1906) by a table 

 which exhibits the prices of refined beet-sugar at Calcutta and Bombay, 

 and of Indian raw sugar at Cawnpore, for a number of years ending 1905. 

 The averages of these for the past eight years would be Calcutta, 

 Rs. 10-U-7 ; Bombay, Rs. 11-7-0 ; and Cawnpore (gur) t Rs. 5-11-0. 



Countervailing Duty. It has been urged, moreover, that about the Counter- 

 time beet-sugar first appeared in Bombay, a series of bad years, which 

 culminated in the famine of 1901-2, curtailed Indian production and 

 opened the door for foreign sugar. So firmly, at all events, have the 

 foreign imports been established, that the trade is by many believed to 

 be secure and to have given evidence of an expansion rather than a 

 curtailment. A duty was accordingly imposed in March, 1899, on 

 bounty-fed sugar from foreign countries. It was framed with the inten- 

 tion exclusively of countervailing bounties paid, directly or indirectly, by 

 foreign Governments. This produced an appreciable revenue, which 

 amounted in 1901-2 to 37 lakhs of rupees (and in the six years of its 

 existence to 94 lakhs) ; still, it did not stop the influx of cheap European 

 sugar. The closing of the American markets diverted a still larger supply 

 to India, and the Enactment of 1902 was intended to countervail 

 artificial surplus. The actipn of the Indian and American Governments 

 thu> loroed the ratification of the Convention of Brussels. The im- 

 mediate effect of the Indian duties was to diminish the sugar imports 

 from Europe, and to divert the trade previously . ,:rried on with 

 India by Germany and Austria, to countries which dit not come within 



957 



