H. E. ANNETT. 



289 



Assuming that 40 per cent, is the yield of refined sugar from 

 gur, then in 1876-7, 80,000 tons of date sugar reckoned as gur was 

 exported from the above three districts alone. 



The corresponding report issued for 1881-2 remarked that " raw 

 date sugar is one of the most important manufactures of Nuddea 

 district and it is said that there are no less than 60 sugar manu- 

 factories in Chooadanga alone. The sugar industry in Jessore is also 

 said to be decidedly on the increase. The total production of raw. 

 sugar in Jessore is reported to be 400,000 maunds (equal to 1 ,000,000 

 maunds of gur or 37,000 tons) worth Rs. 16,00,000. There is only 

 one establishment in Jessore for the manufacture of sugar after 

 the European method, at Tahirpur, but no statistics of its outturn 

 have been obtained." 



In 1888 1 Bengal (presumably including Eastern Bengal) is again 

 said to have produced 743,000 maunds of date gur. This is only 

 about 27,000 tons. The figures seem to show that the sugar traffic 

 had considerably detracted by this time but Watt admits they may 

 have been much underestimated. 



Turning to more recent figures, in the following table is set out 

 the approximate amount of gur produced from the juice of the date 

 palm in Bengal, from 1902-3 to 1910-11. For these figures we are 

 indebted to the Director of Agriculture, Bengal. They are based 

 on the estimates of the district officers. 



1 Statistics of sugar plauts and sugar in 1888. Department of Agriculture, Bengal. 



