Along the banks of the New River, just south of Orange Walk Town at Tower Hill is Belize Sugar Industries Ltd., a sugar mill that manufactures raw sugar from sugar cane.
Sugar cane was introduced to the Corozal District in the late 1840’s from the Yucatan. In the 1950’s around 2,000 acres of sugar cane was planted. Today over
40,000 acres of land is used for sugar cane farming in the northern lowlands of Belize and sugar accounts for over 60% of the country’s agricultural exports.
Trucks loaded with sugar cane line the road to the sugar factory, where the cane is crushed to extract the sugar. Eight tons of cane is needed to produce one ton of sugar. The sugar is loaded onto barges boats transport the sugar down the river, along and along the coast of Belize to the Port.
On our jungle river tour to Lamanai, we saw boats headed towards to the mill, and barges being loaded for transport. It was very interesting to see this operation up close from the river.
Another very interesting "side trip"--thanks for sharing!! We sure do love you both---GiGi & Bill
Posted by: Aletha Anderson | May 21, 2009 at 04:29 AM