32 



opportunity for waste and fraud in selling improperly desij^ned 

 machinery and in the erection of inefficient mills. The waste in 

 an inefficient sugar mill is too gi'eat and too far reaching to 

 be permitted. Therefore, it seems reasonable that the Govern- 

 ment should exercise the right to pass at least upon the plans 

 of all centrals not for the exclusive use of an individual or of a 

 corporation. 



SUGAR SCHOOL 



The Bureau of Agriculture owns 363 hectares of very good 

 sugar land at La Carlota in the Island of Occidental Negros which 

 at present the Bureau is using as an experiment station. The 

 community in which the station is located is in need of a modern 

 central. It has been suggested that the Government erect on 

 its sugar estate at La Carlota a complete modern sugar mill, 

 costing perhaps f*^60,000, to be operated for two purposes : First, 

 as a commercial mill for the manufacture of the sugar of the 

 locality; and, second, as a sugar school for the education of the 

 sugar planters of the Islands in the details of growing sugar cane 

 and in managing sugar mills. It is thought by those who are 

 most earnestly advocating this plan that the earnings of the mill 

 would easily support the school. 



If the sugar business is developed extensively in the Islands, 

 there will be great demand for young men to take positions in the 

 centrals as engineers, superintendents, and assistant chemists, 

 and it will be altogether better to prepare young Filipinos to take 

 these positions of responsibility than to import men from the 

 United States, England, and Germany for this work. 



An incidental but important feature of the sugar-producing 

 business is the supply of w^ork animals on the plantations. This 

 in turn is dependent upon the success with which the ravages of 

 rinderpest are controlled and upon the facilities that are provided 

 for the introduction of work stock from Indo-China. Importa- 

 tion, however, should be resorted to only as a temporary relief. 

 The birth rate in carabao, I am informed by the Director of 

 Agriculture, exceeds the death rate by some 15 or 20 per cent a 

 year, even under present conditions of rinderpest control. 

 Unless, therefore, the development of the industries in the Islands 

 should be so rapid as to absorb this natural increase in work 

 animals, there would soon be no need of importing stock from 

 other countries. Indeed, the Philippines should have the rin- 

 derpest under such control and should manage their carabao in 

 such manner as soon to be exporting work animals instead of 

 importing them. 



