This book is a geography of the sugar cane industry from its origins to 1914. It describes its spread from India into the Mediterranean during medieval times, to the Americas and its subsequent diffusion to most parts of the tropics. It examines the changes in agricultural and manufacturing techniques over the centuries, and its impact in forming the multicultural societies of the tropical world.
"Shanti is a heroine that the reader will not easily forget. The story that is told here is worth not only knowing but also remembering." – Siphiwe Gloria Ndlovu, author, filmmaker and academic Vividly set against the backdrop of 19th century India and the British-owned sugarcane plantations of Natal, written with great tenderness and lyricism, Children of Sugarcane paints an intimate and wrenching picture of indenture told from a woman's perspective. Shanti, a bright teenager stifled by life in rural India and facing an arranged marriage, dreams that South Africa is an opportunity to start afresh. The Colony of Natal is where Shanti believes she can escape the poverty, caste, and troubling fate of young girls in her village. Months later, after a harrowing sea voyage, she arrives in Natal only to discover the profound hardship and slave labour that await her. Spanning four decades and two continents, Children of Sugarcane demonstrates the lifegiving power of love, heartache, and the indestructible bonds between family and friends. These bonds prompt heroism and sacrifice, the final act of which leads to Shanti's redemption.
While the Yucatán Peninsula of Mexico may conjure up images of vacation getaways and cocktails by the sea, these easy stereotypes hide a story filled with sweat and toil. The story of sugarcane and rum production in the Caribbean has been told many times. But few know the bittersweet story of sugar and rum in the jungles of the Yucatán Peninsula during the nineteenth century. This is much more than a history of coveted commodities. The unique story that unfolds in John R. Gust and Jennifer P. Mathews’s new history Sugarcane and Rum is told through the lens of Maya laborers who worked under brutal conditions on small haciendas to harvest sugarcane and produce rum. Gust and Mathews weave together ethnographic interviews and historical archives with archaeological evidence to bring the daily lives of Maya workers into focus. They lived in a cycle of debt, forced to buy all of their supplies from the company store and take loans from the hacienda owners. And yet they had a certain autonomy because the owners were so dependent on their labor at harvest time. We also see how the rise of cantinas and distilled alcohol in the nineteenth century affected traditional Maya culture and that the economies of Cancún and the Mérida area are predicated on the rum-influenced local social systems of the past. Sugarcane and Rum brings this bittersweet story to the present and explains how rum continues to impact the Yucatán and the people who have lived there for millennia.
Sugarcane: Agricultural Production, Bioenergy and Ethanol explores this vital source for "green" biofuel from the breeding and care of the plant all the way through to its effective and efficient transformation into bioenergy. The book explores sugarcane's 40 year history as a fuel for cars, along with its impressive leaps in production and productivity that have created a robust global market. In addition, new prospects for the future are discussed as promising applications in agroenergy, whether for biofuels or bioelectricity, or for bagasse pellets as an alternative to firewood for home heating purposes are explored. Experts from around the world address these topics in this timely book as global warming continues to represent a major concern for both crop and green energy production. - Focuses on sugarcane production and processing for bioenergy - Provides a holistic approach to sugarcane's potential – from the successful growth and harvest of the plant to the end-use product - Presents important information for "green energy" options
This volume is intended for reference by the commercial sugar cane grower. Disciplines are covered for the successful production of a sugar cane crop. A number of good books exist on field practices related to the growing of sugar cane. Two examples are R.P. Humbert's The Growing of Sugar Cane and Alex G. Alexander's Sugarcane Physiology. Volumes of technical papers, produced regularly by the International Society of Sugar Cane Technologists, are also a source of reference. Perhaps foremost, local associations, such as the South African Sugar Technologists' Association, do excellent work in this regard. In my forty-five years of experience with the day-to-day problems of producing a satisfactory crop of sugar cane, deciding what should be done to produce such a crop was not straightforward. Although the literature dealing with specific subjects is extensive, I tried to consolidate some of the material to provide the man in the field with information, or an overview of the subject matter.
The House That Sugarcane Built tells the saga of Jules M. Burguières Sr. and five generations of Louisianans who, after the Civil War, established a sugar empire that has survived into the present. When twenty-seven-year-old Parisian immigrant Eugène D. Burguières landed at the Port of New Orleans in 1831, one of the oldest Louisiana dynasties began. Seen through the lens of one family, this book traces the Burguières from seventeenth-century France, to nineteenth- century New Orleans and rural south Louisiana and into the twenty-first century. It is also a rich portrait of an American region that has retained its vibrant French culture. As the sweeping narrative of the clan unfolds, so does the story of their family-owned sugar business, the J. M. Burguières Company, as it plays a pivotal role in the expansion of the sugar industry in Louisiana, Florida, and Cuba. The French Burguières were visionaries who knew the value of land and its bountiful resources. The fertile soil along the bayous and wetlands of south Louisiana bestowed on them an abundance of sugarcane above its surface, and salt, oil, and gas beneath. Ever in pursuit of land, the Burguières expanded their holdings to include the vast swamps of the Florida Everglades; then, in 2004, they turned their sights to cattle ranches on the great frontier of west Texas. Finally, integral to the story are the complex dynamics and tensions inherent in this family-owned company, revealing both failures and victories in its history of more than 135 years. The J. M. Burguières Company's survival has depended upon each generation safeguarding and nourishing a legacy for the next.
The Growing of Sugar Cane develops the fundamental principles of the growing of cane in the hope that cane culture throughout the world will benefit by it. The tremendous strides made in recent years in the knowledge of how to improve the growing of sugar cane, form the subject of this treatise. Cane growing is not a science. As the results of research replace tradition and guesswork, yields are expected to continue to rise. The book opens with a chapter on the factors that affect sugar cane growth. This is followed by separate chapters on seedbed preparation, sugar cane planting, the nutrition and irrigation of sugar cane, drainage, weed control, flowering control, ripening and maturity, harvesting and transportation, and pest and disease control.
Sugar Cane is the alias of an aspiring song writer, and through his attempts to break into the world of entertainment readers are given the behind the scenes activities of small-time producers.
This book is about the life of a little boy born during WW II raised on a sugarcane plantation in Southern Louisiana. These were hard times for poor folks who had to work very hard to earn meager living wages to support their families. Although money was scarce, living and working on the land allowed you to grow and raise much of your food, which the city people could not do. Generally, one had food or the means to get food if you were inclined to do so by working extra time on the land, provide it was after your normal work day was completed. Some landowners would not allow workers to use their land for gardens. Times were hard, and folks were poor, but most of us did not know we were poor because all of our friends and neighbors had the same things; we had nothing. You made the most of what you did have. It was a simple time when you could grow your own food and make your own toys to entertain yourself and your friends. As a youngster, I had plenty fun times, growing up on the plantation. This book is about some of those times as best as I can recall them. Most of this book is written in the manner that we talked before education came into play. If this story were told with proper English and punctuation, the reader would miss out on the flavor of the times of these happenings.
Physiology of Sugarcane looks at the development of a suite of well-established and developing biofuels derived from sugarcane and cane-based co-products, such as bagasse. Chapters provide broad-ranging coverage of sugarcane biology, biotechnological advances, and breakthroughs in production and processing techniques. This single volume resource brings together essential information to researchers and industry personnel interested in utilizing and developing new fuels and bioproducts derived from cane crops.
