East-India sugar. Papers respecting the culture and manufacture of sugar in British India: also notices of the cultivation of sugar in other parts of Asia. With miscellaneous information respecting sugar.

  • East India Company
Date:
1822
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: East-India sugar. Papers respecting the culture and manufacture of sugar in British India: also notices of the cultivation of sugar in other parts of Asia. With miscellaneous information respecting sugar. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    16/582
    Report of Com¬ mittee of Buying and Warehouses, ] 1 lii Dec. 1822. First Appendix. Second Appendix. Tird Appendix. • • • propounded by the General Court, viz. to ascertain the causes which obstruct the consumption of East-India Sugar in the United Kingdom. At the date of the former proceedings of the General Court, there was no very distinct information upon record of the past or present state of the culture of Sugar in Bengal and the adjacent provinces. It was matter of general belief, that every part of India produced Sugar, and had done so for time immemorial: but the publications of that day (very unfortunately, as your Committee view it) greatly misled the British Public, by asserting that the commodity was so abundant, and the price so low, that Indian Sugar could be ootained in any quantity, at about five shillings sterling per hundred¬ weight. v Authentic and distinct information being indispensable, it was ordered, agreeably to a suggestion contained in the former Report* that the Collectors of the Indian Revenues should be called upon to ascertain various particulars relative to the existing state of the Sugar cultivation, its increase or decrease ; whether it laboured under any peculiar disadvantages which could be removed by proper encourage¬ ment; what was the quantity of land fit for sugar but lying waste, and various other particulars, which were comprised in twenty-six separate heads of inquiry. It is proper to notice, that, previous to the arrival of the above instructions in India (which took place in September 1792) the Board of Trade at Calcutta had entered into the consideration of the Sugar Trade with much zeal, and had recorded some important commercial documents thereupon ; which arriving in England before the required Reports of the Collectors of the Revenue, * were of great use in ex¬ plaining the subject, which at that time highly interested the Public, who were very inadequately supplied with Sugar, and which of con¬ sequence bore a high price. Your Committee have caused a complete collection to be made of the papers that are entered upon the Indian records, which appear to be useful towards a full understanding of the culture and manufacture of Sugar in India. A collection of the Court's correspondence with the several Pre¬ sidencies respecting Sugar is also annexed. Your Committee have further caused a collection of documents to be prepared from the writings of scientific persons of Indian experience •on * The Reports of the Revenue Collectors will be found in p. 163 to 182 of the First Appendix to this Report: it is proper to remark, however, that the Revenue Reports are not drawn up directly in answer to the questions put by the Court of Directors in April 1792, but to certain queries of the B >ard of 3 rade, dated the 7th of August 1792, which will be found in p. 61 t f the First Appendix. The twenty-six questions of the Court of Directors do not appear to have been transmitted to the Collectors, hut to have been sent to the Commercial Agents at the Factories in pursuance of a Minute of the Board of Trade ol the 12ih October 1792, p. 125 of the First Apptn lix. The answers of the Commercial Agents to the twenty-six questions will be found in theTirst Appendix, p. T33 to 162.