Sugarcane belongs to the grass family. It’s a Wetland crop. Also, tropical crops. It can grow well in alluvial soil and black soil. It consumes a lot of water. It can grow from 6 feet to 19 feet in height based on the type of sugar cane. It’s the world’s largest crop by production quantity. It is being cultivated on about 26.0 million hectares in more than 90 countries. Brazil is the largest producer of sugar cane in the world. The next five major producers are India, China, Thailand, Pakistan, and Mexico.
The origin of sugar cane is Papua New Guinea, which is located in eastern Indonesia, around 6000 BC. From here, it has spread to other South and Southeast Asia.
Jagger, which is produced from sugar cane also a traditional food ingredient of Indians. Approximately 2500 years before itself, a hint was mentioned in the Ayurveda medical book Sushruta Samhita that Jagger can cure Rheumatic and digestive Diseases. In BC 4th century BC, the Arthasastra book had a few hints about jaguars and sugar.
There is no harm in eating pure Jagger if it is produced without any chemical process. It is rich in fiber. It has the capability to clean the Esophagus, stomach, and lungs since it is triggered to produce digestive acids.
In BC, 5th century Indians made Kandu (Solid Sugar) and sold to overseas. In AD 627, few people from China came to India to learn how to make sugar during the period of the Harsha Empire.
For many decades, except in South Asian countries, people used only honey for sweetness.
AD, 8th century, Arabic Merchants came to India and got back sugar. Mediterranean Countries, Mesopotamia, Egypt, and North Africa got sugar through the Arabs.
During the past 7 centuries, the entire world has turned on three items. Sugar cane, Pepper, and Silk. Sugar cane and sugar were the reason for the slave trade for many years.
Due to limited natural resources, Europe believes in importing food and some necessary items. During the 11th century, sugar was introduced to Europe. But it is used only by rich people since it is very costly. The fixed tax on selling sugar is also very high. As per the historical note, in 1319, 1kg of sugar was priced are 100 US dollars. So they used to call sugar white gold.
Due to crusade(Siluvai war) at 1492, Europe involved to find a new marine path to India. Columbus from Spain started to find new ways to reach India since India is rich in sugar. Unfortunately, he reached a Caribbean island and found a new landscape that is rich in sugar cane.
At that time, Europeans were not ready to spend much effort on producing sugar cane, but they wanted more sugar. During this time, the European colony existed in eastern African countries. So they reached African leaders and sold people for money and brought to Caribbean, western South America and south north America. So they produced more sugar cane on free land, free slave people. They put conditions like one slave has to cut one ton of sugar cane. Slaves people not allowed to take more food and get a long sleep. Slaves are abused. This incident is called as Triangle Trade.
Triangular Trade: Europeans bought slave people from eastern Africa for money and brought them to the American colonies. They produced sugar cane, cotton, and Tobacco by slave people and brought produced items back to European countries. They produced dresses, rum, sugar and sold them back in Africa. By the profit, they invested in buying slaves. From the 16th century, approximately 300 years, this triangular trade happened. As per historical note, in the 18th Century Britain bought 50,000 slaves per year from Africa to bring to America to produce sugar cane. So, sugar cane is the main reason for many 18th-century wars.