Impact of the varieties/technologies developed under AICRP on Sugarcane

The relative contribution of an improved variety and production technology dwell around 70: 30 under normal conditions. Here, the impact of leading variety/proven technology is given to give a glimpse of the total impact over the years at the national level.


    1- Impact of the varietal development

  • Sugarcane varieties developed under this Project since 1970-71 for all the 5 sugarcane growing zones in the country brought about 2.7 times increase in sugarcane production and added significantly to the National Exchequer.
  • Different varieties made the dent during their productive periods.
  • At present following outstanding varieties went like wild fire among the farmers and increased the sugarcane and sugar productivity.
  • Based on the certain parameters and experiences, a brief account of impact assessed/estimated is given as under-

Tropical Region:

  • Impact analysis of Co 86032 as done by Ram et al, 2017 indicated that that the cane yield level was maintained at about 100 t/ha throughout the period except during drought year corresponding with the cultivation of CO 86032 in Tamil Nadu. The variety spread in almost all the states of Tropical India including Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Gujrat, unified Andhra Pradesh and Kerala. The variety covered 11.96 m ha area which approximately generated Rs. 20354 crore as additional monetary benefits.

  • The impact analysis of variety on sugar recovery with the base year of 1999-2000 revealed that with introduction of the variety Co 86032, the average sugar recovery increased to 9.45% compared to previous varieties (8.69%). The improvement in the sugar recovery was calculated in monetary value.

    2- Subtropical Region:

    Monitory benefits accrued to the farmers/millers by adoption of variety Co 0238

    Additional cane produced due to increased yield of Co0238= 79.64 lakh tonnes and due to increased sugar recovery (%) was estimated to be 2,71,687.84 tonnes which amounted to be of Rs 815.06 crore The total value of additional sugarcane and sugar was worked out to be 2229.92+815.06=3044.98 crore. Thus, per ha additional income to the farmers comes to about Rs 34196/ha and additional income to the sugar mills comes around Rs 12499 on hectare basis.


    Area expansion under improved varieties of the Project in Uttar Pradesh:

    The trend of area expansion over total cultivation of sugarcane and depicted through Fig.1. The data as obtained from the office of Cane Commissioner Government of Uttar Pradesh clearly indicated that there has been an exponential growth of area brought under improved varieties developed under this project. The total cultivated area of AICRP varieties was increased from 5.93 % to 93.4% over the same period in Uttar Pradesh.


    Spread of AICRP varieties during 2016-17 in subtropical India

    The area under top four popular varieties (Co 0238, Co 0239, Co 0118 and Co 98014) in subtropical India comprising major sugar producing states (such as Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand) is about 9.97 lakh ha (41.8%) during 2016-17 crop season. Out of these four varieties, Co 0238 occupied about 8.63 lakh ha (36.19%) area in these four states and spread faster than other new varieties (Fig. 2 & 3).


    Estimated benefits accrued due to trench method in Uttar Pradesh

    This method is spreading fast in sugarcane growing areas of sub-tropics as growers can realize high input use efficiency and it provides ample scope for accommodating inter-crops between sugarcane rows. This method is ideally suitable for mechanized operation, less labour requirement, enhanced water use efficiency. Under this method of planting, farmers can obtain an average cane yield of 110 t/ha with a Cost benefit ratio of 2.15.


          

    Impact analysis is based on the data available from department of U.P. Cane Commissioner Office. The total actual area of area planted during 2016-17 under 9 different zones (Saharpur, Meerut, Muradabad, Bareilly, Lucknow, Faizabad, Devipatan, Gorakhpur and Devria of UP. This method is very much suitable for planting of sugarcane as well as intercropping. Intercrop provides an additional income to grower mid season to sustain their monetary requirement instead of waiting for one year. Trench method of planting occupied an area of 41.88% of total sugarcane cultivated area in Uttar Pradesh. The approximate benefit from this technology was achieved as Rs 777.6 crore during 2015-16 to the growers. A total benefit expected to generate due to this technology will be more than 6 billion during 2017-18 in Uttar Pradesh. The detail information of analysis was presented as below:


    Table. Estimated benefits of trench method of planting in UP during 2015-16

    Item Unit
    Total cropped area (Plant & ratoon) of sugarcane in UP 2.16 m ha
    Approximate total area under trench method of planting 0.648 m ha
    Estimated improvement in cane yield by trench method of planting 4.0 t/ha
    Contribution of trench method in total cane yield 2.592 m t
    Minimum support price of sugarcane (Rs) Rs 3000 /t
    Total benefits generated due to trench method technology (Rs) 7776 million