Sugar Beet

sugar beet, (Beta vulgaris), one of the four cultivated forms of the plant Beta vulgaris of the amaranth family (Amaranthaceae), cultivated as a source of sugar. Sugar beet juice contains high levels of sucrose and is second only to sugarcane as the major source of the world’s sugar. For information on the processing of beet sugar and the history of its use, see sugar.

The sugar beet was grown as a garden vegetable and for fodder long before it was valued for its sugar content. Sugar was produced experimentally from beets in Germany in 1747 by chemist Andreas Marggraf, but the first beet sugar factory was built in 1802 in Silesia (now in Poland). Napoleon became interested in the process in 1811 because a British blockade had cut off the French Empire’s raw cane sugar supply from the West Indies. Under his influence, 40 beet sugar factories were established in France. Although the industry temporarily collapsed after Napoleon’s fall, it recovered in the 1840s. Beet sugar production then increased rapidly throughout Europe, and by 1880 the tonnage had overtaken that of cane sugar. Beet sugar now accounts for almost all sugar production in the European Union and for about one-fifth of total world production.