In Russia the government fixes the amount of sugar required each year for domestic consumption and this quantity may be sold by the manufacturer. Then it determines what quantity shall be kept in reserve, to be sold when the price exceeds that named by the government commission (4.30 rubles[25] per pood[26] in winter, or 4.45 rubles in summer). Should the production exceed the amounts fixed for domestic consumption and reserve, exportation is permitted and the exporter gets back the excise, 1.75 rubles per pood, or if he elects to sell this excess at home, he may do so by paying double tax, or 3.50 rubles per pood. Of the alternatives, exporting the surplus is the more advantageous to the owner of the sugar, as the fixed price for domestic sugar is a profitable one. He therefore can afford to take a loss on the sugar he sells for export and still make money on the total operation. The stipulation that the contingent interest in the profitable home market shall keep pace with the growth of the output of the factory is also a substantial encouragement to manufacturers to increase their production. Regulations like these naturally have the effect of supplying foreign markets with cheap sugar. The manufacturer makes an excellent profit and the domestic consumer pays the entire bill. Primarily, the intent may have been to keep the price of domestic sugar at one level and to enable the manufacturer to fill the home demand without having to go outside the country for his raw-sugar supply. But the plan in its actual working fosters exportation at the expense of the home consumer. While in Russia the cartel was a government measure, the pooling of interests by German and Austrian manufacturers in their respective countries accomplished the same end. A cartel formed in Russia in 1890 came to grief after four years through the individual greed of its members. In 1898 a new combination of raw-sugar producers and refiners was formed, with the express proviso that the manufacturers of raws were to sell their product only to refiners who were members of the cartel. The domestic trade in white sugar was prorated among the refiners, in consideration of which they had to allow the producer a fixed price of 30 kronen ($6.08) per 100 kilograms (220.4622 lbs.) for raw sugar, the market price of which was paid by the buyer and the difference by the cartel, which got the money by notching up the price of domestic refined sugar. With the cartel the only seller of refined, and sugar from foreign countries shut out by the high surtax (the difference between the impost on imported and domestic sugars), the consumer had to pay the price demanded by the cartel as long as the difference between the world’s price and that established by the cartel was less than the surtax.