Sugar

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Magnified crystals of refined sugar

Magnification of typical sugar

Sugar includes monosaccharides and disaccharides, and also the more complex trisaccharides and oligosaccharides . Monosaccharides, or "simple sugars", include fructose, glucose, galactose, and ribose. Disaccharides are composed of two monosaccharides bonded together, and include sucrose, lactose, and maltose. These simple carbohydrates are important in the production of energy in the body, particularly in the process glycolysis.

The word sugar most commonly refers to sucrose, or "table sugar," a white, crystalline, solid disaccharide. Sucrose, derived from sugarcane or sugar beet, is the sugar most commonly added to foods in order to alter flavor (to promote sweetness) and physical properties (such as preservation and texture) of food and beverages. However, the extent of its use varies from culture to culture. This sugar also has tremendous social and health implications when one considers the history of sugar cultivation and slavery, and sugar's relationship with major health epidemics like obesity and Type II diabetes. High fructose corn syrup, another common added sugar, is also highly relevant to the latter issue.

Chemistry

Sucrose, a disaccharide composed of one glucose molecule (left) and one fructose molecule (right)

Monosaccharides, disaccharides, trisaccharides and the oligosaccharides contain 1, 2, 3, and 4 or more monosaccharide units respectively. Most sugars conform to (CH₂O)_n where n is between 3 and 7. The reactive components of sugars are the hydroxyl groups (—OH), and the aldehyde (-CHO) or ketone groups (C=O), which contain carbon-oxygen double bonds.

Sugars may also be classified by the number of carbons they contain. Pentoses are sugar molecules composed of five carbon atoms and include ribose, a component of several chemicals that are important to the metabolic process, including NADH and ATP. Hexoses (6 carbon sugars) include glucose which is a universal substrate for the production of energy in the form of ATP. Glucose is produced through photosynthesis in plants and is then converted for storage as an energy reserve in the form of other carbohydrates such as starch, or as sucrose in cane and beets.

Monosaccharides have the chemical formula C₆(H₂O)₆, with oxygen and hydrogen atoms that differ in position in each sugar molecule. These "simple sugars" sucrose, fructose, glucose, galactose, maltose, lactose and mannose are the building blocks of more complex sugars. For example, sucrose, a disaccharide is composed of one glucose molecule and one fructose molecule. Likewise, lactose (milk sugar) is made from glucose and galactose, and maltose is made from two molecules of glucose. These disaccharides have the formula C₁₂H₂₂O₁₁.

Natural Origins

Fructose occurs naturally in many fruits, honey, and some root vegetables such as sweet potatoes, parsnips, and onions. Lactose is the sugar found in milk. As described, glucose can be found naturally in the tissues of plants and is a vital component to both animal and human diets. Those disaccharides such as maltose, produced in the germination of cereals such as barley, and sucrose are more commonly added to foods, although they have natural origins as well.

Sucrose, utilized as the common table sugar, comes from plant sources. The most important two sugar crops are sugarcane and sugar beets, in which sugar can account for 12%–20% of the plant's dry weight. Some minor commercial sugar crops include the date palm, sorghum, and the sugar maple.

Most cane sugar comes from countries with warm climates, such as Brazil, India, China and Australia (in descending order). Beet sugar comes from regions with cooler climates: northwest and eastern Europe, northern Japan, plus some areas in the United States including California.

Production

Cane

Cane-sugar producers crush the harvested vegetable material, then collect and filter the juice. They then treat the liquid (often with lime) to remove impurities and then neutralize it with sulfur dioxide. Next, the juice is boiled during which sediment settles to the bottom and scum rises to the surface, both of which are removed. The heat is then turned off and the liquid crystallises, usually while being stirred, to produce sugar crystals. It is usual to remove the uncrystallised syrup with a centrifuge. The resultant sugar is then either sold as is for use or processed further to produce lighter grades. This processing may take place in another factory in another country.

Beet

Beet-sugar producers slice the washed beets, then, extract the sugar with hot water in a 'diffuser'. An alkaline solution ("milk of lime" and carbon dioxide from the lime kiln) then serves to precipitate impurities. After filtration, the juice is concentrated into about 70% solids by evaporation, and then the sugar is extracted by controlled crystallisation. The sugar crystals are removed by a centrifuge, and the liquid is recycled during the stages of crystallization. Sieving the result white sugar produces different grades for selling. When economic constraints prevent the removal of more sugar, the manufacturer discards the remaining liquid, now known as molasses.

Cane versus beet

Little perceptible difference exists between sugar produced from beet and that from cane. Tests can distinguish the two, and some tests aim to detect fraudulent abuse of EU subsidies or to aid in the detection of adulterated fruit juice.

The production of sugar results in residues which differ substantially depending on the raw materials used and on the place of production. While cooks often use cane molasses in food, molasses from sugar beet is unpalatable for humans, and therefore used mostly as industrial fermentation feedstock, or animal feed. Once dried, either type of molasses can serve as fuel for burning.

Culinary sugars

Raw sugars comprise yellow to brown sugars made from clarified cane-juice boiled down to a crystalline solid with minimal chemical processing. Raw sugars are produced in the processing of sugar beet juice but only as intermediates en route to white sugar. Types of raw sugar available as a specialty item outside the tropics include demerara, muscovado, and turbinado. Mauritius and Malawi export significant quantities of such specialty sugars. Raw sugar is sometimes prepared as loaves rather than as a crystalline powder: in this technique, sugar and molasses are poured together into molds and allowed to dry. The resulting sugar cakes or loaves are called jaggery or gur in India, pingbian tong in China, and panela, panocha, pile, and piloncillo in various parts of Latin America.

Mill white sugar, also called plantation white, crystal sugar, or superior sugar, consists of raw sugar where the production process does not remove colored impurities, but rather bleaches them white by exposure to sulfur dioxide. This is the most common form of sugar in sugarcane growing areas, but does not store or ship well; after a few weeks, its impurities tend to promote discoloration and clumping.

Blanco directo, a white sugar common in India and other south Asian countries, comes from precipitating many impurities out of the cane juice by using phosphatation — a treatment with phosphoric acid and calcium hydroxide similar to the carbonatation technique used in beet-sugar refining. In terms of sucrose purity, blanco directo is more pure than mill white, but less pure than white refined sugar.

White refined sugar has become the most common form of sugar in North America as well as in Europe. Refined sugar can be made by dissolving raw sugar and purifying it with a phosphoric acid method similar to that used for blanco directo, a carbonatation process involving calcium hydroxide and carbon dioxide, or by various filtration strategies. It is then further decolorized by filtration through a bed of activated carbon or bone char depending on where the processing takes place. Beet sugar refineries produce refined white sugar directly without an intermediate raw stage. White refined sugar is typically sold as granulated sugar, which has been dried to prevent clumping. Granulated sugar may also be found in the form of powdered sugar, confectioners' sugar, icing sugar, superfine sugar, and sugar cubes, all which vary in crystal sizes.

Brown sugars derive from the late stages of sugar refining, when sugar forms fine crystals with significant molasses-content, or by coating white refined sugar with a cane molasses syrup. Their color and taste become stronger with increasing molasses-content, as do their moisture-retaining properties. Brown sugars also tend to harden if exposed to the atmosphere, although proper handling can reverse this.

Hydrolysis can convert sucrose into a syrup of fructose and glucose, producing invert sugar. This resulting syrup is sweeter than the original sucrose, and is useful for making confections because it does not crystalize as easily and thus produces a smoother finished product.

History

Sugarcane, a tropical grass, probably originated in New Guinea. In the course of prehistory, its prominence spread throughout the Pacific Islands, India, and by 200 B.C.E., it was being grown in China as well.

In 510 B.C.E., soldiers of the Emperor Darius (Darius the Great) near the Indus River discovered "reeds which produce honey without bees," and the plants remained exotic in Europe until the Arabs started cultivating it in Sicily and Spain. Only after the Crusades did it begin to rival honey as the sweetener in Europe. The Spanish began cultivating sugar cane in the West Indies in 1506, and in Cuba in 1523. It was first cultivated in Brazil 1532 by the Portuguese.

Originally, people chewed the cane raw to extract its sweetness. Sugar refining developed in the Middle East, India and China, where sugar became a staple of cooking and desserts. Early refining methods, first developed by inhabitants of India in 500 B.C.E., involved grinding or pounding the cane in order to extract the juice, and then boiling down the juice or drying it in the sun to yield sugary solids that resembled gravel. Understandably, the Sanskrit word for "sugar" (sharkara), also means "gravel". Similarly, the Chinese use the term "gravel sugar" (Traditional Chinese: 砂糖) for table sugar.

In later times sugar spread to other areas of the world through trade. It came to Europe with the arrival of the Moors. Crusaders also brought sugar home with them after their campaigns in the Holy Land, as there they encountered caravans carrying "sweet salt". While sugar cane would not grow in northern Europe, sugar could be extracted from certain beets and these began to be widely cultivated around 1801, after the British control of the seas during the Napoleonic wars isolated mainland Europe from the Caribbean.

The history of sugar in the West

The Arabs and Berbers introduced sugar to Western Europe when they conquered the Iberian peninsula in the 8th century AD. The 1390s saw the development of a better press, which doubled the juice obtained from the cane. This permitted economic expansion of sugar plantations to Andalusia and the Algarve. In the 1420s, sugar was carried to the Canary Islands, Madeira and the Azores.

In 1493 Christopher Columbus stopped at Gomera in the Canary Islands, for wine and water, intending to stay only four days. He became romantically involved with the Governor of the island, Beatrice de Bobadilla, and stayed a month. When he finally sailed she gave him cuttings of sugarcane, which became the first to reach the New World.

The Portuguese took sugar to Brazil. Hans Stadenwrites in his account of the New World, published in 1533, that by 1540 Santa Catalina Island had 800 sugar-mills and the north coast of Brazil, Demarara and Surinam had another 2000. Approximately 3000 small mills built before 1550 in the New World created an unprecedented demand for cast iron gears, levers, axles and other implements. Specialist trades in mold making and iron casting were inevitably created in Europe by the expansion of sugar. Sugar mill construction is the missing link of the technological skills needed for the Industrial Revolution that is recognized as beginning in the first part of the 1600s.

After 1625 the Dutch carried sugarcane from South America to the Caribbean islands — from Barbados to the Virgin Islands. In the years 1625 to 1750, sugar was worth its weight in gold. Prices declined slowly as production became multi-sourced especially through British colonial policy. Sugar production also increased in the American Colonies, Cuba, and Brazil. African slaves became the dominant plantation worker as they were resistant to the diseases of malaria and yellow fever. European indentured servants were in shorter supply, susceptible to disease and a less economic investment. Local Native Americans had been reduced by European diseases like smallpox.

With the European colonization of the Americas, the Caribbean became the world's largest source of sugar. These islands could grow sugar-cane using slave labour at vastly lower prices than cane sugar imported from the East. Thus the economies of entire islands such as Guadaloupe and Barbados became based on sugar production. The largest sugar producer in the world, by 1750, was the French colony known as Saint-Domingue, today the independent country of Haiti. Jamaica was another major producer in the 1700s.

During the eighteenth century, sugar became enormously popular and went through a series of booms. The heightened demand and production of sugar came about to a large extent due to a great change in the eating habits of many Europeans - who could now be more hedonistic with food choices. For example, they began consuming jams, candy, tea, coffee, cocoa, processed foods, and other sweet victuals in much greater numbers. Reacting to this increasing craze, the islands took advantage of the situation and began harvesting sugar in extreme amounts. In fact, they produced up to ninety percent of the sugar that the western Europeans consumed. Of course some islands were more successful than others when it came to producing the product. For instance, Barbados and the British Leewards can be said to have been the most successful in the production of sugar because it counted for 93% and 97% respectively of each island’s exports.

Planters later began developing ways to boost production even more. For example, they began using more animal manure when growing their crops. They also developed more advanced mills and began using better types of sugar-cane. Despite these and other improvements, the prices of sugar reached soaring heights, especially during events such as the revolt against the Dutch^{[citation needed]} and the Napoleonic wars. Sugar remained in high demand, and the islands' planters knew exactly how to take advantage of the situation.

As Europeans established sugar-plantations on the larger Caribbean islands, prices fell, especially in Britain. The previous luxury product began, by the eighteenth century, to be commonly consumed by all levels of society. At first most sugar in Britain was used in tea, but later candies and chocolates became extremely popular. Sugar was commonly sold in solid cones and required a sugar nip, a pliers-like tool, to break off pieces.

Sugar-cane quickly exhausts the soil, and growers pressed larger islands with fresher soil into production in the nineteenth century. For example, it was in this century that Cuba rose as the richest land in the Caribbean (with sugar being its dominant crop) because it was the only major island that was free of mountainous terrain. Instead, nearly three-quarters of its land formed a rolling plain which was ideal for planting crops. Cuba also prospered above other islands because they used better methods when harvesting the sugar crops. They had been introduced to modern milling methods such as water mills, enclosed furnaces, steam engines, and vacuum pans. All these things increased their production and production rate.

After the Haïtian Revolution established the independent state of Haiti, sugar production in that country declined and Cuba replaced Saint-Domingue as the world's largest producer.

Long established in Brazil, sugar production spread to other parts of South America, as well as to newer European colonies in Africa and in the Pacific.

Sugar Today

Napoleon, who cut off from Caribbean imports by a British blockade and obstinate to funding British merchants anyway, banned sugar imports in 1813. The beet-sugar industry that emerged in consequence grew, and today, sugar-beet provides approximately 30% of world sugar production.

While no longer grown by slaves, sugar from developing countries has an on-going association with workers earning minimal wages and living in extreme poverty. Cuba was a large producer of sugar in the 20th century until the collapse of the Soviet Union took away their export market and the industry collapsed.

In the developed countries, the sugar industry relies on machinery, with a low requirement for manpower. A large beet-refinery producing around 1,500 tonnes of sugar a day needs a permanent workforce of about 150 for 24-hour production.

Sugar as food

Originally a luxury, sugar eventually became sufficiently cheap and common to influence standard cuisine. Britain and the Caribbean islands have cuisines where sugar usage has become particularly prominent.

Sugar forms a prominent element in confectionery and desserts. Cooks use it as a food preservative as well as for sweetening.

Health concerns

Argument continues as to the value of extrinsic sugar (sugar added to food) compared to that of intrinsic sugar (sugar, seldom sucrose, naturally present in food). Adding sugar to food particularly enhances taste, but has the primary drawback of increasing caloriecontent, and when consumed in excess in the diet, promotes the onset of disease and other health concerns, either proven or perceived. While the traditional concerns of sugar consumption has been tooth decay and hyperactivity, excessive sugar intake has been most currently related to increased trends of obesity, and is very dangerous for those suffering from Type II diabetes.

In 2003, four United Nations agencies, the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), commissioned a report compiled by a panel of 30 international experts. It stated that the total of free sugars (all monosaccharides and disaccharides added to foods by the manufacturer, cook or consumer, plus sugars naturally present in honey, syrups and fruit juices) should not account for more than 10% of the energy intake of a healthy diet, while carbohydrates in total should represent between 55-75% of the energy intake (table 6, page 56 of the WHO Technical Report Series 916, Diet, Nutrition and the Prevention of Chronic Diseases). However, the Center for Science in the Public Interest states that the typical American eats 16% of his calories from added sugar. Moreover, the USDA recommends that the typical diet should not contain more than 10 teaspoons of added sugar a day. Despite this suggestion, the same agency found that Americans eat double that amount of sugar a day, 20 teaspoons, and that sugar consumption is increasing and has been increasing almost every year since 1982.

Type II diabetes

Type II diabetes, is one of the greatest health concerns in relation to excessive sugar consumption. When sugar is consumed, blood glucose levels rise and are mediated by the body's endogenous production of insulin. However, in Type II diabetes, little or no insulin may be produced or insulin may become resistant, and no longer incorporate glucose from the blood into cells. The cells become deprived of energy and over time, excessive glucose in the blood may begin to damage some organs such as the eyes or kidneys. Obesity promotes the onset of this acquired form of diabetes.

Hyperactivity

The general public in the U.S. commonly believes that eating too much sugar (not only sucrose, but also other varieties such as glucose) will cause some children to become hyperactive — giving rise to the term "sugar high" or "sugar buzz". Recent studies have not shown a link between the consumption of sugar and hyperactivity levels, even when the researchers focused on children with a presumed "sugar-sensitivity". If parents and teachers believe in the possibility of a sugar-high, this may cause them to perceive children as more energetic and excited after consumption of sweets and sugary beverages through observer bias. Note that these experiments were not done in the context of a control group following a base diet level matching the recommendation of the WHO/FAO stated above to avoid the impacts of added extrinsic sugars cited above so are not conclusive. They do show that increased levels of sugar intake above the high level taken in a standard US diet have no impact on levels of hyperactivity that may or may not already be present.

Others believe that children and adults show the hyperactive effects of sugar equally. On average Americans eat or drink 5 pounds of sugar a month, drastically higher than 10 years ago due to the fact that sugar is in many foods under many different names.^{[citation needed]}

Sugar economics

In the financial year 2001/2002, 134.1 million tonnes of sugar were produced worldwide. Moreover, there was over twice as much sugar produced in developing countries as in developed countries. The greatest quantity of sugar is produced in Latin America, the United States and the Caribbean nations, and in the Far East.

The European Union (EU) has become the world's second-largest sugar exporter. The Common Agricultural Policy of the EU sets maximum quotas for members' production to match supply and demand, and a price. Excess production quota is exported (approx 5 million tonnes in 2003). Part of this is "quota" sugar which is subsidised from industry levies, the remainder (approx half) is "C quota" sugar which is sold at market price without subsidy. These subsidies and a high import tariff make it difficult for other countries to export to the EU states, or compete with it on world markets. The U.S. sets high sugar prices to support its producers with the effect that many sugar consumers have switched to corn syrup (beverage manufacturers) or moved out of the country (candy makers).

The cheap prices of glucose syrups produced from wheat and corn (maize) threaten the traditional sugar market. In combination with artificial sweeteners, drink manufacturers can produce very low-cost products.

In many industrialized countries, sugar has become one of the most heavily subsidized agricultural products. The European Union, the United States, and Japan all maintain elevated price-floors for sugar through subsidizing domestic production and imposing high tariffs on imports. In recent years, sugar prices in these countries have exceeded prices on the international market by up to three times.

Within international trade bodies, especially in the World Trade Organization, the "G20" countries led by Brazil have argued that because these sugar markets essentially exclude their cane-sugar exports, they receive lower prices than they would under free trade. While both the European Union and United States maintain trade agreements whereby certain developing and less-developed countries (LDCs) can sell certain quantities of sugar into their markets, free of the usual import tariffs, countries outside these preferred trade regimes have complained that these arrangements violate the "most favored nation" principle of international trade.

In 2004, the WTO sided with a group of cane-sugar exporting nations (led by Brazil) and ruled the EU sugar-régime and the accompanying ACP-EU Sugar Protocol (whereby a group of African, Caribbean, and Pacific countries receive preferential access to the European sugar market) illegal. In response, the European Commission proposed on 22 June 2005 to radically reform the EU sugar regime, cutting prices by 39% and eliminating all EU sugar exports. The African, Caribbean, Pacific and Least developed country sugar exporters have reacted with dismay to the EU sugar proposals, arguing for a fairer reform of the EU regime which would be pro-development and meaningful towards the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals.

Small quantities of sugar, especially speciality grades of sugar, reach the market as 'fair trade' commodities; the fair-trade system produces and sells these products with the understanding that a larger-than-usual fraction of the revenue will support small farmers in the developing world.

See also

• Biobutanol
• Brown sugar
• Palm sugar
• Caramel
• Corn syrup
• Fermentation
• Glycomics
• Golden syrup
• Holing cane
• Natural brown sugar
• Stevia, a herb many times sweeter than pure sugar
• Sugar plantations in the Caribbean
• Sugar substitute

References

ISBN links support NWE through referral fees

• Rogozinsky, Jan. A Brief History of the Caribbean. 1999. Penguin Putnam. New York. ISBN 0-452-28193-8
• A C Hannah, The International Sugar Trade, ISBN 1-85573-069-3
• William Dufty, Sugar Blues, ISBN 0-446-34312-9

External links

History and culture

• Plant Cultures: botany, history and uses of sugar cane
• Big Sugar: documentary

Food

• Cook's Thesaurus: Sugar (www.foodsubs.com)

Health

• Expert Report on diet and chronic disease (WHO/FAO)
• Sugar accelerates aging
• Center for Science in the Public Interest sugar-labeling campaign

Trade

• Wide range of information about sugars, from the Canadian Sugar Institute, a non-profit trade association of Canada's refined sugar manufacturers.
• Least Developed Countries sugar site
• African, Caribbean and Pacific sugar exporters
• Sugar Traders Association of the UK
• European Union sugar-régime proposals
• WTO ruling on the EU sugar-régime
• US Sugar Import Program
• Sugar statistics

Sugar and hyperactivity

• "Sugar Buzz, Fiber Know-How" article from WebMD
• "The Myth of the Sugar Buzz" article from Skepticism.Net
• Sugar and the use of the biased funding and reports at the Rotten Library

Chemical

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