Impact of High Sugar Early Maturing Varieties for Sustainable Sugar Production in SubTropical India

Abstract

One of the main reasons for stagnant sugar recovery (9.5–10 %) in subtropics is the low area of early maturing varieties (<25 %). The area has not been increased up to the desirable extent. There is much potential to increase the sugar recovery of this region by giving preference for the cultivation of early maturing, high sugar varieties which tend to mature fast and accumulates higher sucrose % and purity in less time. A study was conducted to assess sustainability in the sucrose content of seven early maturing varieties from early crushing (October) to the late crushing (April) period. All the seven varieties, viz. CoS 8436, CoS 08272, CoSe 03234, CoSe 98231, UP 05125, Co 0238 and Co 0118 showed promising results in terms of sucrose %, fibre % and pol % in cane; however, maximum sucrose per cent was recorded in variety Co 0118 which ranged from 15.42 to 20.67 % which was followed by varieties Co 0238, CoS 08272 and UP 05125 (13.56–20.27 %) from early to late crushing period. Pol % cane showed the same increasing trend in all the seven varieties. The fibre % of the varieties ranged between 12.44 and 13.10 %, which gradually increased about 1.5 units in all the varieties up to the month of April. The observation was carried out in this regard in sugar processing units, and our analysis revealed that the mills have achieved a very high sugar recovery of about 12 % by increasing the area under early maturing sugarcane varieties (>60 %).