SUGAR BEET CROPS

Evening Post, Volume CXXVI, Issue 26, 30 July 1938, Page 8

SUGAR BEET CROPS

SUCCESS IN TARANAKI

(By Telegraph.) (Special to the "Evening Post."}

NEW PLYMOUTH, This Day.

"After seeing good crops of sugar beet grown for two years on well over 100 farms in central and south Taranaki, and with a wide range of soil fertility and climate, we have no hesitation in saying that sugar beet can be successfully grown in Taranaki," states the annual report of the South Taranaki Boys' and Girls' Agricultural Clubs.

In amplifying the report, Mr. R. Syme, Hawera, gave figures yesterday indicating that the growing of sugar beet was worth while from a stockfeeding viewpoint, while the high yields obtained compared with English returns showed that beet growing as an industry would bear investigation.

Yields in the United Kingdom from areas where the crop is grown commercially range from 8 to 25 tons an acre. In South Taranaki club tests of 49 plots gave an average yield of 45 tons 15cwt for roots only. The average would probably have been about 8 per cent, lighter for washed " roots. An analysis of roots last year for sugar content disclosed a range of from 13.92 per cent, of eucrose in large roots to 15.34 per cent, in medium-sized roots. This is considered a very satisfactory figure, although the yields obtained in South Taranaki are so much greater than the results achieved commercially in the United Kingdom. The information obtained cannot necessarily be taken as indicating that the sugar beet industry in New Zealand would be any more profitable than in England as other factors such as labour costs would have to be considered.