Read the passage from Sugar Changed the World. In one part of Russia, though, the nobles who owned
the land were interested in trying out new tools, new
equipment, and new ideas about how to improve the
soil. This area was in the northern Ukraine just crossing
into the Russian regions of Voronigh and Hurst. When
word of the breakthrough in making sugar reached the
landowners in that one more advanced part of Russia,
they knew just what to do: plant beets.
Cane sugar had brought millions of Africans into
slavery, then helped foster the movement to abolish the
slave trade. In Cuba large-scale sugar planting began
in the 1800s, brought by new owners interested in
using modern technology. Some of these planters led
the way in freeing Cuban slaves. Now beet sugar set
an example of modern farming that helped convince
Russian nobles that it was time to free their millions of
serfs. And that is precisely where Marc's family story
What is the purpose of this passage?
O to explain the new technologies farmers used in the
1800s
O to connect a period of Russian history with the
history of sugar
O to explain to readers how enslaved Africans differed
from Russian serfs
o to give background information about the origins of
cane sugar