Sugar cane in Baracoa! It seems a crazy thing in a mountainous land where the common is to talk about coconut, coffee, chocolate trip, honey, great forests and delicious rivers…

You would not relieve it, but let’s tell the story: in 1803, Baracoa, in spite of its geography, became one of the six ports of the island to export sugar, not in the common way we know today but like pan sugar in boxes.

Such activity lasted till 1859, and in that period the sugar trade was made also to other regions of the country including Maisi, Imias and Moa.

14 sugar mills of American construction and 45 or 50 slaves produced approximately 50 thousand pounds of sugar cane.

The production was cane after cane and the juice went to five large pans that cooked the guarapo (juice) till it became a solid element (pan sugar) that was put in boxes to be traded.

All the production was made in two or three plantations in Baracoa’s mountain, where a group of French increased the farming of sugar cane as well as that of the coffee.

The sugar company was prosperous till 1859. Later, in 1870, great investments were made in Matanzas, La Havana and Villa Clara, so the old sugar refineries were left to satisfy only very particular needs.