Established in 1901, the Chiaotou Sugar Refinery was the largest sugar refinery in Kaohsiung County and Taiwan's first sugar refinery to employ automated production. Before it stopped refining sugar in the 1990s, the sugar refinery and the surrounding sugarcane fields powered the economies of Chiaotou and the surrounding communities.
建造於 1901 年的橋頭糖廠，是全高雄縣規模最大的糖廠，也是全台第一座自動化生產的糖廠，在 90 年代停止製糖以前，糖廠運作所釋出的工作和周圍的蔗糖種植，曾是橋頭和鄰近鄉鎮最主要的經濟來源。