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Farming Today: Sugar Beet

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Sugar Beet

BBC Radio 4 - Farming Today, Sugar Beet

Anna Hill talks all this sweet, at Cantley Sugar Factory in Norfolk.

Anna Hill visits a sugar factory in Norfolk, to follow the process from a mud-covered sugar beet root to a bag of clean, white crystals.

Half of all the sugar we use in the UK comes from home grown sugar beet. 3,000 growers produce about 8 million tonnes of sugar beet each year, and it's all bought and processed by just one company - British Sugar. Anna Hill has been to their sugar factory at Cantley in Norfolk to learn how a muddy root is used to make clean, white crystals of refined sugar. 

Along the way she find out how this year's harvest is shaping up, learns about the damage sugar beet can do to the soil, and hears worries about an insecticide ban coming in next year.

She also looks at the potential impact of Brexit on this globally traded commodity.

Presented by Anna Hill. Produced by Heather Simons

Intelligent speech, the most insightful journalism, the wittiest comedy, the most fascinating features and the most compelling drama and readings anywhere in UK radio.

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