What Drove The Sugar Trade?

Categories: Trade And Commerce

Sugar is a very tempting and delightful sweetener to foods used every day, all over the world to satisfy our appetites. One year after Christopher Columbus’s first voyage in 1493, Columbus introduced cane sugar to the islands of the Caribbean. During this time sugar was not known to most people in Europe. That changed soon enough and caused the production of sugar to become a large industry. The sugar trade was driven by land and climate, consumer demand, and the economy.

Land and climate was a major factor in driving the sugar trade.

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Included in Document 1 is a Colonial Map of the Caribbean. The map presents that most Caribbean land are colonized by the British, French, and Spanish. Referring the map to Document 2, explains that an ideal climate average for the growth of cane sugar is sixty-eight degrees Fahrenheit to ninety degrees Fahrenheit which slaves are forcefully working and growing sugar out in the heat.

It is an evident fact the British, French, and Spanish bought this land using slaves in an undesirable climate to grow lots of sugar on their land which pushed the sugar trade. Displayed in Document 6, are requirements of what a sugar plantation of five hundred acres should require. A few of the requirements are a boiling house, distilling house, rum house, and salt provisions. All of these houses on this one large piece of land help advance the sugar trade by the production of sugar all being done in one place. Land and climate drove the sugar trade by having great geography, weather, location, and temperature.

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Consumer demand was another main component of advancing the sugar trade. In Document 4, the author Sidney W. Mintz stated, “…all contain stimulants and can be properly classified as drugs (together with tobacco and rum, though clearly different both in effects and addictiveness).” In this quote, the author is referring to tea, coffee, and chocolate, and the use of sugar in them. It is evident that Mintz is using her own opinion which is incorrect.

Mintz is alleging tropical products are as harmful as drugs and alcohol and comparing drugs and alcohol to these tropical products, tropical products are absolutely not as damaging to health. Also, while alcohol and drugs are illegal in some places, tropical products should not be compared to drugs and alcohol like that. The tropical products which include sugar in them despite being addictive, will have a high demand to all consumers. Furthermore, the image shown in Document 3A show children eating sugar out of hogsheads which impound between 700 and 1200 pounds of sugar that trade to the West Indies, displaying demands for the sugar were high.

Also, in Document 3B, Benjamin Mosely states, “…The increased consumption of sugar, and increasing demand for it, exceed all comparison… the influence of sugar, that once touching the nerves of taste no person was ever known to have the power of relinquishing the desire for it.” The addictiveness for sugar was booming. In Document 5 also, the British Sugar Consumption chart shows that as the population was increasing, consumption continued to rise also revealing demand was high being complementary to other products. Consumer demand drove the sugar trade by sugar being an enhancement, sweet, and a complementary to other products.

Furthermore, the economy was one more factor out of the many that helped push the sugar trade. In Document 6, William Belgrove wrote a list of what a sugar plantation of five hundred acres of land required. One of the bias requirements he wrote was, “A proper room to confine disorderly Negroes”. That statement clearly shows racism to innocent slaves. It is evident that Belgrove does not think of slaves as human. Instead of having a room to confine them, he should let them go and should not have brought them to the land in the beginning.

It could be a waste of time and money when you can just grow more sugar to earn money without using slaves. Corresponding with Document 8, a picture is shown displaying slaves working in a boiling house and on a plantation. Just like in Document 6, these slaves are not needed. It is a fact the English believed in life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness, and that all men are created equal which is stated in the Declaration of Independence and Constitution.

This effects the economy in the sugar trade by using these slaves when buying them for a one time purchase and earning more money out of them growing sugar. Also, in Document 12, author Phillip Roden explains the mercantile system which are laws that let English merchants and manufacturers buy raw materials from the colonies at low prices and then sold them for higher prices, causing to affect their economy remarkably by England gaining more money than losing. The economy drove the sugar trade by mercantilism, slave labor, and demand cost.

Many factors drove the sugar trade such as, land and climate, consumer demand, and economy. The sugar trade and what drove it is significant because sugar is an additive people use and consume every day and the factors of it are what result in everyone having sugar for use in countries everywhere today. Starting from the 1400’s to now, sugar will always be common and important to our world.

What Drove the Sugar Trade And Commerce?

In 1493, Christopher Columbus introduced cane sugar to the islands of the Caribbean. At that time, sugar was practically unknown to most people in Europe. However, it became so popular later in Europe. There are 3 factors that drove the sugar trade; the demand of sugar, the plantations, and the mercantilism The high demand of sugar was one of the biggest reasons that drove the sugar trade. The sugar became so popular when it arrived Europe, the picture in document 3 that made by E. T, Parris, shows that how much people loved sugar, people were actually extremely crazy about sugar at that time. People loved sugar because it made everything taste much better, especially with tea, coffee, and chocolate. The chart in document 5 shows us the increasing of the demand of sugar. From 1700 to 1730, the population of Britain only increased for about 61,000, but the imports of sugar increased from 28,070,000 pounds to 6,862,000 pounds, and the sugar annual consumption increased for 6.5 pounds per person. From this we can clearly see the high demand of the sugar.

The second reason that drove the sugar trade is plantations, which include lands, climate, and slave. Since people want to make some profits by trading sugar, they need a nice farm and an ideal climate for growing sugar. From the chart in document 2, we can see that Jamaica and Barbados have perfect climate for growing sugar. So this allowed people to make more and more sugar, and get a lot of money from it. At that time, the slave is very cheap, that chart in document 9 shows us that average purchase price of adult male slave on West African coast in 1748 is £14, and the average selling price of adult male slave in the British Caribbean is £32. So, we can see the slave is not expensive at all. This allowed people to get a lot of slaves work on the farm, which meant more sugar produced. From the chart in document 10, we can easily see how much the ton of sugar produced grew in 80 years, because of the growing of slave population.

The last reason that drove the sugar is mercantilism. Merchant saw a wonderful chance to get profits from trading sugar. In document 12, it said, “ the parliament in English passed a series of laws dealing with colonial shipping, trade, manufacturing and money. The point of these laws was to set up a trading system based on was good for the mother country, which called the mercantilism or mercantile system… The result was national wealth that led to national power.” In addition, some of the most power people at that time, like John Goldstone, and William Beckford gained wealth by trading sugar. In conclusion, sugar was not well known in 1493. However the three factors I talked about had driven the sugar trade. Due to these three factors, sugar trade developed so fast and became a huge industry in Europe.

Updated: Jan 30, 2023
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What Drove The Sugar Trade?. (2016, Apr 28). Retrieved from https://studymoose.com/what-drove-the-sugar-trade-essay

What Drove The Sugar Trade? essay
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