Sugar Essay

Sugar, a sweet crystalized substance, is a commodity that all of society today has acquired. The uses of sugar in the diet of people today is unlimited. Sugar is used in desserts, drinks, as a decoration, and much more. Sugar can be found in almost everything sold at the local grocery store. In Great Britain, by its first introduction, sugar became a most desirable product. It was the increased use of sugar that led to the increase consumption of tea in the British diet. The British desired tea, which they acquired from trade with the Chinese. The desire for tea is one contributing factor that led to the first Opium war.

It was in 1640 that the British sugar industry began when the British acquired Barbados. Sugar production began to increase through the seventeenth century. The original consumers of the first sugar produced by the British sugar colonies were British themselves. Throughout the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the consumption of sugar in British colonies continued to increase. The consumption of sugar in Britain is due to the increased production by the British sugar colonies.

We can see that Englishmen understood well the benefits of having their own sugar-producing colonies, and that they also understood better and better the growth potential of the British market for sugar. Hence it is no surprise that later centuries saw the production of tropical commodities in the colonies tied ever more closely to the British consumption-and to the production of British holds and factories.

With the increase production, there was a decreased in the price of sugar. It was perceived to be more economically beneficial if sugar was obtainable by individuals of all social classes. Therefore, by 1750, the p...

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... the tea that British society desired.

Therefore, if it were not for the introduction of sugar to the English diet, the use for sugar as a sweetener may not have been established. For when sugar was place in tea, a new habit began. This habit of drinking tea, in a sense was as addictive as opium for the Chinese society. They were both products of plants that were ingested. Both were also used a weapons against one another; it was a fight for power over each other. China used tea to monopolize trade, and Britain used opium to break down and weak the Chinese and eventually gain favorable trade of China. This would then give Britain the unlimited accessibility to tea. Sugar intensified the drinking habit of tea. It was sugar affect British society so extensively that over time it would influence conflicts between two nations. These conflicts led to the Opium war.