By the turn of the 20th century, the world population had doubled. In response to this growing market, a new economic phenomenon took place, first in the USA: the industrialisation of food production. This revolution was due to several factors, including the mechanisation of agriculture, the use of artificial fertilisers, the invention of new preserving and processing methods and a new transport infrastructure. Most of the old American sugar refineries disappeared. They were replaced by a few large and increasingly powerful corporations, with vast amounts of capital to invest and crucially an increased ability to lobby and influence governments. Not only was more food being produced but it became cheaper to buy. This trend for cheaper foods and global business monopolies has continued to this day. All the major brands of foods and drinks that we buy, and quite a few of the smaller brands too, are owned by a handful of global corporations.

The rise of global capitalism did not stop governments from controlling the availability and price of sugar: a regular supply of the commodity was too important to be left purely to market forces. When the First World War broke out, Britain was dependent on German beet sugar for most of its supply. Immediately, sugar stopped coming to Britain and within days, the government had established a Royal Commission for Sugar Supplies (later to become the "Sugar Board") to try and remedy the problem. Sugar rationing followed, with much anger and complaints from the local population, and British farmers were subsidised to grow sugar beet. The same issues resurfaced during the Second World War. The industry was then dominated by the company Tate & Lyle and after the war, the new Labour government considered nationalising the company, so important did it think that sugar was in the British diet. Tate & Lyle vigorously fought off the nationalisation with its campaign "Tate Not State" and won!

In Britain, as well as many other parts of the world, the sugar industry has been shored up by governments for most of the last century through state protection, guaranteed prices and subsidies. This is in contrast to earlier times, when governments received substantial revenues from import duties on sugar: In the 19th century, the US Government made two thirds of its income from import duties, with sugar duties representing 20 percent of this amount. In modern times however, sugar has become so important in everyone’s diet that governments have felt compelled to subsidise the market. Lobbying by powerful sugar producers has no doubt played an important part in influencing government minds.

Sugar had long been known as a food preserver. During the second half of the 19th century, new methods were invented and fruit preserves, jellies and jams became widely available. As a result of the opening up of the markets, the price of sugar plummeted and the now affordable preserves and other new products were quickly adopted by everyone. As it happens, poorer people did not eat many fresh fruits at the time, because in excessive amounts they can cause diarrhoea. Jam manufacturers had to work quite hard at the beginning to persuade people to eat preserves, despite the fact that cheap jam was actually mostly sugar with very little fruits. Nevertheless, bread and jam became the main diet of poor children from 1870 onwards. And this tradition has perdured: white bread and jam is still a common meal today for children in poorer families, together with eating sweet biscuits, because all are filling and cheap.

Before the Industrial Revolution, most meals had been eaten at home, prepared from scratch using local ingredients. The kitchen was women’s domain. When women started working outside the home in textile mills, men weren’t going to take up cooking, were they? Spending less time preparing food became a priority for the home makers and the new jams and preserves fitted in perfectly: The concept of convenience food was born. Bread and jam bought from a shop was a quick meal, it tasted good too and had plenty of calories. These "modern" foods represented progress: a new social order was emerging where for the first time individuals could aspire to and even acquire some of the privileges reserved for the better classes, even if these privileges amounted only to some jars of cheap jam. Everyone could move up in the world by becoming a consumer, even if this ended up costing them more, both in terms of their health and their purse.