VALUE OF SUGAR BEET

Dominion, Volume 33, Issue 12, 9 October 1939, Page 6

VALUE OF SUGAR BEET

Enhanced By The War

EXPERIMENTS IN NEW ZEALAND Great Possibilities Seen Dominion Special Service HASTINGS, October 7. For a number of years tentative experiments with the cultivation of sugar beet have been carried out with a good measure of success in various parts of New Zealand, and a start is to be made with the development of the industry on an extensive scale. The value of the crop both to the Dominion and to the Empire has been immeasurably enhanced by the war, and, according to Mr. W. Greening, Havelock North, who was one of the first in the country to realize the possibilities of the crop, conditions in the Dominion are so favourable that there is no reason why New Zealand should not be in a position to manufacture her own sugar in a few years’ time. The maximum of sunshine is essential to the success of the crop, and as Hawke’s Bay is particularly well favoured in this respect the ■industry may mean much to the province. From his own experiments Mr. Greening has compiled comparative statistics which establish conclusively the superiority of the New Zealand-grown root over that grown on the Continent. In sugar content, in size and weight, and in the yield an acre, even the poorest crop raised in the Dominion was considerably better than the best achieved in Czechoslovakia and elsewhere. Mr. Greening has had all the figures confirmed by experts. Sugar beet can be grown in any soil suitable for mangolds, but the climate of New Zealand is the deciding factor, and the Dominion product has a higher and more even germinating power than any other. Diversity of Uses. The diversity of uses to which the beet and by-products of the crop can be put suggests the enormous advantages that would accrue to the primary industries of the Dominion through its extensive cultivation. Apart from the direct importance of its sugar content, the root has a food value that extends to cnttle, sheep, pigs and even poultry. When sugar beet tops have been fed to dairy stock the results, specially in relation to increased butterfat and milk flow, have been very considerable; factory-treated beet pulp has been successfully used for fattening sheep; pig-breedens have found th? root of inestimable value for fattenning purposes; and certain of the properties of the beet make it a valuable extra food for poultry. A consideration of equal importance, according to Mr. Greening, is the enormous rise in the productivity of the land that would result from the extensive sowing out of root crops, specially sugar beet. He believes that rotation of crops is essential for the good of the soil, which he thinks wotdd be enriched by the intensive cultivation necessary for root growing.

Successful experiments of a similar type have also been carried out in Canterbury and Taranaki.