Roots awaiting delivery to the factory from December to February are stored in protected storage to maintain the highest possible quality and sugar content. Agriculture Facts 8,500 beet growers. Crop area 150,000 hectares. Annual production around nine million tonnes of beet. Produces approximately 1.4 million tonnes of sugar and 750,000 tonnes of animal feed.
Sugar beet remains one of the most highly profitable arable crops for UK farmers.
British Sugar pays around 300 million annually for the whole beet crop. Seed is sown in March and early April. The crop is harvested between mid-September and the end of December. Processing begins in September and lasts until late February.