The main focus of the chapter Sugar Islands: The Sugar economy of Madeira and the Canaries <\/em> is \u201cWhite Gold\u201d or sugar. The chapter starts off by talking briefly about how the sugar trade gets setup up on these two islands and the various property rights that went into owning the land. Before moving onto the next major topics the author discusses how water was brought to the properties and the various difficulties that came up in regards to getting water. The author then talks about the depression of the late 15th century and then a rise in the early 15th century in the value of sugar and then another depression shortly after. This sort of fluctuation in the market of sugar is mentioned various times throughout the rest of the chapter. The rest of the chapter deals with things like the trade of sugar amongst groups and the production of sugar. (Vierira, Pg 42 \u2013 47)<\/p>\n Though Sugar became a big business, that growth was built off the back of slavery as a means to produce large quantities of \u201cwhite gold\u201d. These slaves were brought in, in part because of a lack of laborers on the islands and also because both of these locations are very close to Africa. This point is also brought up by Erin<\/a> who also talks about similar points in regards to how there were not that many people available to farm the land so groups turned to using slavery. (Vierira, Pg 56 -58)<\/p>\n This whole chapter in a way links up with the last reading, Chapter 4 of The Atlantic World<\/em>, which discussed the altercations that nations had with each other in the Americas and Europe. In a way, this chasing of profit in the sugar economy could be seen as an extension of that fighting, without the use of weapons.<\/p>\n