ioi6 A Co-operative Sugar Factory, [march, 



lime is 42 tons. Coal costs nearly gd. per ton of beets. The 

 "campaign " staff, which numbers about 500 for day and night 

 shifts, receives about ^5,600 in wages. This does not include 

 the pay of the heads of the factory or the office staff. As it is 

 seldom that one hears of an estimator of the cost of an 

 English factory saying anything about the expense of keeping 

 the place in order when it is not working, it is worth noting 

 that at Dinteloord, without counting head officials and the 

 office staff, there are sixty men on the place after the sugar- 

 making is over. 



The shareholders receive wet pulp. Most of them live 

 close at hand so that they prefer wet slices to dry, but the 

 factory tries to squeeze out as much water as possible. 



I was assured that only three out of the twenty-five joint 

 stock sugar factories in the Netherlands pay for beets 

 according to the percentage of sugar, in the same way as the 

 co-operative ones do. After the season of 1910-11 Dinteloord 

 paid off more than ^4,000 in redemptions. As a result of 

 this season (191 1-12) it will probably carry more than ,£20,000 

 to reserve, and the members will be paid about 8s. ^d. more 

 per ton for their beets than they would have got, so I was 

 informed, from the joint stock companies. 



The co-operative factory struck me as frugally, but efficiently 

 planned. The co-operators reduce the amount of their 

 machinery by contenting themselves with the production of 

 an unrefined white sugar. It is thought that this is more 

 profitable than refining, which means increased capital, a 

 higher excise duty, and finding trade customers. Everyone 

 who has thought about these considerations attaches weight 

 to them, though an experienced sugar firm may well find a 

 great advantage in refining as well as in simply making 

 sugar. 



Dinteloord has been happy in the time of its starting. After 

 the Sas van Gent factory was started sugar prices went down ; 

 since Dinteloord's first season, prices have kept going up. The 

 managing director laid the greatest stress on the help this had 

 been. If old hands in sugar beet culture, not unacquainted 

 with sugar manufacture, attach importance to such a piece 

 of good fortune, how necessary it is that English factory 

 promoters should be far-seeing and cautious. When I went 



