Sugar Industry and Improved Sugarcane Farming Technologies in China

Abstract

Since 1980s, the Chinese sugar industry has been developing at a fast pace. In the milling year 2007/2008, the total sugar production in China reached 14.83 MT, which was 24.04 % higher than that in previous milling year, and cane sugar production reached 13.67 MT, which was 92.18 % of the total. Guangxi is the largest sugarcane and sugar producer in China, which produced 9.41 MT sugar in 2007/2008 and 8.56 MT sugar in 2013/2014. China has developed a series of unique farming technologies in commercial sugarcane production and has developed an advanced technology system since 1990s. These technologies include deep ploughing and fine preparation of soil, economical fertilization system; trash addition to field, water-saving irrigation, use of pathogen-free healthy seedcane, rational application of vinasse in sugarcane field, chemical control, mechanization for sugarcane management, and comprehensive control of diseases, pests and weeds. The exploitation and comprehensive application of the new sugarcane farming technologies have promoted the Chinese sugar industry to a new level in about every 5 years, and made China become the third biggest sugar-producing country in the world. However, the sugar industry has been experiencing a very difficult time in the last two milling years because of the worldwide low sugar price and the high production cost at the domestic level, which led to a substantial reduction in sugarcane-growing areas and sugar production. Mechanization and the related sugarcane variety selection and farming technology development have become the bottleneck for sustaining the development of the sugar industry in China.