Some characteristics of producing and marketing Cuban Sugar;

              Bulletin HASKINS & SELLS 29
Some Characteristics of Producing and Marketing Cuban Sugar
By J . L . BARNETT, of the New York Office
A SUGAR estate in Cuba divides itself,
in the main, into an agricultural
and a manufacturing department. The
fields are divided into plantations called
colonias, and the land on which the mill,
administration buildings, and employes'
houses are situated is known as the batey.
The agricultural department is busily
engaged the whole year. During the dead
season, from June to December, this de­partment
takes care of cultivating, clean­ing
and ditching old lands, and prepares
virgin lands for planting by tumbling and
burning timber, cleaning up and reburning
fields, cutting and hauling seed cane, and
planting seedings. In the grinding season,
a very important function of this depart­ment,
through the transportation section,
is to keep the mill supplied with cane.
The magnitude of this undertaking is
appreciated when it is realized that a mill
with a seasonal production of 325,000 bags
of sugar grinds every working day approxi­mately
120 cars of cane of 2,000 arrobas
each, or 6,000,000 pounds.
The yield of cane per caballeria (333 1/3
acres) planted on new lands ranges from
100,000 arrobas commencing with the
second crop, to 30,000 at the eighth crop.
In order to obtain fairly high yields, re-plantings
are made at intervals of from
seven to ten years.
The sources of cane are from either the
company's lands operated by it or rented
to outsiders, or from lands owned by
independent farmers. When a company's
lands are rented, contracts are entered
into with the farmers, or colonos, as they
are known in Cuba, covering a period of
years. The terms of these contracts differ
somewhat according to location.
Cane grown by a company on its own
lands is known as administration cane.
This cane is weighed on field scales, located
at loading places on the railroad spurs
that branch out into the plantations and
connect with the batey lines, and again
on the batey scales when the cars arrive
at the mill. As far as the mill is con­cerned,
no distinction is made between
administration cane and that received
from others, because the company's plan­tations
are credited for the value of the
cane at the same number of arrobas of
sugar and the prevailing monthly average
prices paid to colonos who own their lands.
Because of the high average prices that
prevailed for sugar during the grinding
season of 1919-1920, a majority of the
plantations producing administration cane
showed large profits.
As all of the cane is cut by hand and
hauled by ox-carts, the disbursements
made for cutting and hauling administra­tion
cane are charged to the plantations
from which the cane is taken. Cane cut­ters
are paid by weight. The hauling
charge is also based on the weight of the
cane and varies according to the distance
to the railroad spur as well as whether the
company's oxen and carts are used. Driv­ers
employing their own live stock and
carts are paid twice as much as those who
use the company's equipment. The weights
used in paying for cutting and hauling are
those recorded by the field scales. For
this reason it is essential that these scales
be in agreement with those located on the
batey.
Each cutter has assigned to him a driver
who hauls the cane to the field scales. In
a number of sugar estates, the field
weighers are provided with small liquida­tion
books. These forms are printed in
triplicate and the first and second copies
are perforated. After the cane is weighed,