Climate Cuba's supremacy as a low cost sugar producer is largely 



of Cuba due to especially favorable climatic and soil conditions, to- 



gether with proximity to the greatest sugar markets of the 

 world. The sugar cane is a plant requiring warm temperatures and much 

 moisture during the maturing months, if the most successful results are to 

 be attained. "The climate of Cuba," says an official study of the cane sugar 

 industry, "is tropical and distinctly insular in characteristics of humidity, 

 equability and high mean temperature. There are two distinct seasons, 

 a dry season from November to April, and a hotter wet season from 

 May to October. The average mean temperature of the island is about 

 77 F. Temperatures below 50 or above 90 are rare. The highest record 

 is 100.6 and the lowest is 49.6. The average temperature of the hottest 

 months (July and August) is about 82 and the coldest months (December 

 and January) about 71. The mean relative humidity averages about 75 

 per cent and remains fairly uniform at all times of the year." 



Rainfall Unlike other important cane producing regions, rainfall in 



in Cuba Cuba, though abundant, is quite uniformly distributed through- 



out the island. Moreover, the major portion of the rainfall oc- 

 curs during the hot summer months when it is most needed by the growing 

 cane. "As a rule," says one authority, "the rainfall is least on the seacoast 

 and greatest in the interior and there is little difference in rainfall between 

 the eastern and western parts of the island. On the north coast the records 

 kept give an average of 50 inches annually; on the south coast 45 inches; 

 and in the interior, five miles from the shore, 60 inches." This adequate and 

 well distributed rainfall makes unnecessary any extensive use of irrigation 

 methods in Cuba. It is an important factor which tends to keep average 

 costs lower than those of other cane growing regions. 



Fertility of The cane sous of Cuba are in general remarkably fertile, 



Cane Soils even in areas where cane culture has been carried on for gen- 



f g~^ -t 



erations. The geological explanation of this marvelous fertility 

 is that the soil of Cuba is formed of the luxurious marine and animal vegetable 

 growth of previous geological ages. Originally, what is now Cuba was part 

 of the ocean bottom and over this area through the ages, great quantities 

 of decomposed organic matter were deposited. In the later geological epochs, 

 the island was pushed up out of the sea by some great volcanic disturbances 

 and thus this great depth of rich organic sediment was brought to the sur- 

 face. Nearly two-thirds of the island is covered with soils which have been 

 derived from organic limestone of this character, although the red and black 

 colors of the soils suggest little of their history. 



17 



