The relative importance of the beet-sugar industry can hest be gathered from the follow ing statistics of the sugar production and con sumption of the world. The United States is the world's greatest consumer of sugar. A compilation by The National City Bank of New York shows that the consumption of sugar in the United States for the fiscal year 1917 was but 82 pounds per capita against 89 pounds in 1914 (the year preceding the war). The total quantity consumed in 1917 'was, however, 8,500,000,000 pounds and we also exported 1,250,000,000 pounds, or 25 times as much as in the year before the war.
The bank's compilation shows that the world's sugar production is now about 12 per cent below that of the year preceding the war. Beet-sugar production in Europe has fallen 43 per cent but cane production in the tropics has increased about 25 per cent. The beet-sugar of Europe, which was 18,500,000,000 pounds in the sugar year 1912-13, was but 10,500,000,000 pounds in 1916-17, and the world cane produc tion, which was a little more than 20,000,0(30,000 pounds in 1912-13 was over 25,000,000,000 pounds in 1916-17; world production of cane and beet sugar in 1913-14 was 42,000,000,000 pounds; in 1916-17, 37,000,000,000 pounds. Beets produced one-half of the world's sugar prior to the war, but in 1916-17 supplied only one-third of the world's total. In the United States and its island possessions there has been a rapid in crease in production. In every one of the sugar areas under the American flag—Porto Rico, Hawaii, the Philippines, and the cane and beet fields of continental United States— there has been a marked increase, the aggregate prod uct of these areas having grown from about 4,000,000,000 pounds in 1912-13 to practically 5,000,000,000 pounds in 1916-17. The share of our consumption drawn from foreign countries has fallen from 75 per cent in 1897 (20 years ago) to 48 per cent in 1917. In consumption of sugar the United States stands at the head of the list of the world countries, our total con sumption being 8,500,000,000 pounds in the fiscal year 1917 against approximately 5,000,000,000 in Germany, 5,000,000,000 in the United Kingdom, and 2,00CI,000,000 in France, the figures for the European countries being those for normal years. Our per capita consumption, however, is less than that of certain other countnes, Denmark's consumption being 93 pounds per capita, England 90, United States 82, Germany 75, Norway and Sweden 60, Netherlands 73, France 40, Russia 30, Spain 15 and Italy 10.
About 25 per cent of our consumption is drawn from our own fields, 27 per cent from our islands and 48 per cent from foreign countries, chiefly Cuba. The value of the sugar entenng continental United States was, in the fiscal year 1914, $155,000,000 and in 1917 $348,000,000, the average import price per pound (including that from the islands) having been, in 1914, 2.3 cents, and, in 1917, 4.6 cents. Our exports of sugar have grown very rapidly during the war, having been, in 1914, 50,000,000 pounds, in 1915 550,000,000, and in 1917 1,250,000,000 pounds, the value of the exports increasing from less than $2,000,000 in 1914 to over $77,000,000 in 1917. Of the 1,250,000,000 pounds exported in 1917, 450,000,000 went to France, about 150, 000,000 to Great Britain, 50,000,000 to Italy, 250,000,000 to neutral Europe and about 150, 000,030 pounds to South America. The world's chief producers of cane sugar are Cuba, India, Java, the Hawaiian and Philippine Islands, and Porto Rico; and the chief producers of beet sugar are Germany, Russia, Austria-Hungary, France and the United States. Cuba, from which we draw our chief imports, is now the world's largest producer, her crop in the sugar year 1916-17 having been 6,730,000,000 pounds; India 5,882,000,000; Java 3,575,000,000; Hawaii 1,288,000,000 and Porto Rico 1,006,000,000 pounds, while Germany's beet-sugar production in 1913 14 (the latest peace year) was 6,093,000,000, Russia 3,898,000,000, Austria-Hungary, 3,774,000 000, France 1,749,000,000, the United States in 1916-17 1,646,000,000 pounds of beet sugar and 613,000,000 pounds of cane. The v;orld's sugar production, as far as can be statistically stated was in 1870 5,00O3000,000 pounds, in 1880 7.000, 000,000, in 1890 13,000,000,000, in 1900 20,000, 000,000, in 1910 33,000,000,000, in 1914 42,000, 000,000, and in 1917 37,000,000,000 pounds, this fall off in 1917 being due to a reduction of product in the beet fields of the European countries at war. Our own consumption has about kept pace with this rapid growth in world production, since we consumed in 1870 23 per cent of the world's output and in 1917 21 per cent of the world total.