74 TUCUMAN and MENDOZA 



where the frosts are sHght. It is in this direction that 

 most of the clearing is now going on. 



These various districts do not offer quite the same 

 conditions to the farmer. The Falda is the most 

 suitable, not only on account of the rareness of frost, 

 but because of the fertility of the soil, as the tropical 

 forest has accumulated inexhaustible stores of humus. 

 The sugar-cane returns are higher there than anywhere 

 else. Irrigation is not necessary, but, on the other hand, 

 the humidity reduces the proportion of sugar in the 

 cane. Irrigation is the rule in the next belt, between 

 the local railway and the Central Cordoba line (on the 

 right bank of the Sali). On the left bank a large 

 number of the estates must still do without watering. 

 The most original feature of the organization of the 

 sugar industry at Tucuman is the maintenance of a 

 class of independent cultivators, the caneros, side by 

 side with the large enterprises. This survival of small 

 and medium properties is a fact to which we find no 

 parallel in the other sugar districts of tropical America.^ 

 Everywhere else, in Brazil and in the Antilles, the 

 farms which worked up their own produce, on primitive 

 methods, have been absorbed by the central works. 

 The home-worker has lost his land as well as been ruined 

 in his industry by the competition of the modern 

 factory. At Tucuman, on the contrary, the sugar 

 industry never passed through the stage of domestic 

 production. It was set up in full development, some 

 devoting their capital to building works, others to 

 growing the cane. Irrigation seemed from the first to 

 dictate a concentration of ownership ; the refineries at 

 Cruz Alta constructed costly special canals to bring 

 the water of the Sali. It is only large proprietors who 

 have the resources needed to carry out work of this 

 kind, and sufficient influence to secure permission to 

 conduct the water over adjoining estates. However, 

 the law of 1897 reorganized irrigation and withdrew 



» Except, perhaps, in Barbadoes. 



