Uttar Pradesh has ended the sugar season 2016-17 as the highest sugar producer in the country by beating Maharashtra, ending the season at 87.5 lakh tonnes, a whopping 22.13% increase as compared to last year.
The state also achieved an average yield of 72.37 tonnes per hectare, which is again the highest. Last year the average yield was 66.46 tonnes per hectare, an increase of 5.9 tonnes per hectare. The increase in the yield has translated into an additional income of Rs5568.32 crores for the farmers.
Speaking to FE, commissioner, cane development and sugar industry, Vipin Kumar Dwivedi, attributed the achievement to the department’s all-out effort in pushing cane development exercises such as promoting the wonder cane variety Co-0238 amongst the farmers and introduction of trench farming in a big way.
“The increase in sugar productivity in UP has a lot to do with the introduction of the new cane variety, Co-0238, which was propagated by Dr Bakshi Ram, director of Coimbatore Sugarcane Research Institute. Of the entire 20.54 lakh hectares under cane cultivation, this wonder cane had been sown over almost 7 lakh hectares, which is almost 35% of the entire cane area.” he said.
As on May 25, 2017, Uttar Pradesh sugar mills have produced 87.5 lakh tonnes of sugar by crushing 824.74 lakh tonnes of sugarcane at recovery rate of 10.61%. While in previous season, UP sugar mills had produced 68.14 lakh tonnes of sugar, from churning 642.31 lakh tonnes of cane at 10.61% recovery.
Besides, state sugar department officials are confident that UP’s sugar production next year too, will in all likelihood surpass the current year’s production and hit the century mark by producing 10 million tonne of sugar.