The Direct Determination of Fibre Content of Individual Cane Consignments

INTRODUCTION. The method of computing payment for cane in the South African sugar industry, based as it is upon the value of the Java ratio, does not always yield results which are regarded as satisfactory by the cane grower. The j ava ratio is influenced by several factors, notably dirty cane, rainfall and the fibre content, but it is only on the effect of the latter that we are concerned here. Where consignments are crushed at a factory in which high fibre cane usually predominates, the effect of introducing a proportion of low fibre cane, such as may occur during a transfer, will lead to a lower price being raid for the latter than would be the case if crushing were done at a factory where low fibre cane predominates. This anomaly is well known, and has been commented on previously in the proceedings of this Association." The anomaly would disappear provided that the weight of fibre yielded by each consignment of cane could be established within the limits of a commercially acceptable accuracy, since the relationship between fibre content and Java ratio is determinate."