Brazil is the world’s largest producer of sugarcane and one of the leading suppliers of sugar and ethanol worldwide. In the 2019–2020 crop season, the country produced 642.7 million tons of sugarcane in a harvest area of 8.44 million hectares. Historically, sugarcane breeding has contributed continuously to increasing yields by regularly releasing superior cultivars for use by the Brazilian industry. In the last 40 years, an average annual increase of 155.7 kg ha−1 of sugar yield has been reported, about half of which may be attributed to breeding programs. However, due to the size of the country, the intensive expansion of the crop to low-fertility soils in the last few years, especially in degraded pasture areas, and the widespread adoption of mechanization, new challenges have been imposed on national breeding programs. This review covers the current situation with sugarcane breeding in Brazil and the main advances that have allowed the country to maintain world leadership in developing the industry. Additionally, the history of sugarcane breeding, current national breeding institutions, germplasm development, key breeding objectives, selection stages and methodologies are summarized. An overview is also presented of biotechnological approaches which have become key tools for improving Brazilian traditional breeding programs. The adoption of strategies to increase Brazilian sugarcane yield, aiming to consolidate crop production in a food and energy matrix, is also discussed.
Sugarcane is the main source for sugar production and the most important crop for energy production, as well as for byproducts like ethanol and fibers in the world. With a complex genome, the plant has its species from crosses between species of the genus Saccharum, which were the basis for sugarcane breeding programs worldwide. The production of sugarcane has increased worldwide due to breeding programs that have developed more productive clones for specific uses and adapted to different climatic conditions. The future objective of breeding programs is to develop sugarcane with high productivity, high sucrose content, drought tolerance, and high production of ethanol and biomass, i.e., plants with high fiber content and with cell walls easily broken to favor the production of ethanol from bagasse, efficient plants with low nitrogen fertilizer use, and others, and consequently to reduce environmental impacts. Currently, the demand for products derived from sugarcane is consistently increasing; the ethanol byproduct has been pointed out as one of the important sources to feed the demand for renewable energy in fossil and nonrenewable fuel substitution programs in different countries around the world. This chapter describes the genetic improvement of sugarcane and its current goals.
O objetivo deste trabalho foi identificar clones de cana-de-açúcar produtivos, com boa estabilidade e adaptabilidade no estado de São Paulo e, também, identificar locais mais representativos para seleção e experimentação. Foram avaliados dez clones e duas testemunhas comerciais de maturação média-tardia em primeira soca de experimentos colhidos em agosto de 2009, utilizando o método de regressão bissegmentada e análise AMMI (Additive Main Effects and Multiplicative Interaction Analysis). Os resultados dos dois métodos foram comparados e evidenciaram que os clones RB975201, RB975157, RB975932, RB975242 e RB975162 foram os mais promissores devido à produtividade superior à das testemunhas, a alta estabilidade verificada em um ou nos dois métodos e a adaptabilidade ampla ou específica. O ambiente Tarumã apresentou maior estabilidade e capacidade de discriminação entre os genótipos, o que permite um ordenamento mais confiável em relação à média geral dos ambientes testados.
RB005014 was developed for the Brazilian central-south region, for harvesting between July and September and planting on soils that have moderate or higher fertility levels. It has high tillering, high sucrose yield, excellent ratooning ability after mechanical harvesting, resistance to the main diseases and carries the Bru1 gene of brown rust resistance.
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