Sugarcane nutrition for food and environmental security/ Nutrição da cana-de-açúcar para segurança alimentar e ambiental

Abstract

Sugarcane is an important cash crop cultivated globally from temperate to tropical regions. Improving cane yield and recovery sustainably is an important research area for improving livelihoods of the cane farmers. Among different approaches sill judicious and integrated use of nutrients as per plant needs holds the special place. Further, applying need based N management through optical gadgets viz. Leaf color chart (LCC), SPAD, Green seeker, integrated nutrient management, fertigation, special focus on for improving the efficiency of different fertilizers through different state of art technologies. For having higher fertilizer use efficiency in sugarcane, some aspects of fertilization especially How much? What type of? When to add? Is it worth? Number of splits? Mode of action? must be considered both for seed or ratoon. Further, soil textural class and climatic conditions on one side while on changing climatic conditions also affected it a lot. Further, inherent fertility status of the soils is also an important factor which affects the fate of applied fertilizers. There is a need to create awareness in between the farmers for not to applying huge quantity of different fertilizers as per their neighboring farmers, rather farmer should be smart enough to adopt different technologies in a smart way for having better benefits and thus livelihoods as the purpose is to fed the canes but not the soil. In the present review an attempt being made to compare the comparative performance of sugarcane with respect to fertilization for finally guiding the sugarcane cultivars. Idea is to enlighten them regarding need based sustainable fertilization with an aim to improve the fertilizer use efficiencies for having improved yield and quality parameters instead of loading the soil with much of fertilizers which further have environmental concerns.

Polyhalite Positively Influences the Growth, Yield and Quality of Sugarcane (Saccharum officinarum L.) in Potassium and Calcium-Deficient Soils in the Semi-Arid Tropics

“…In the Indian Punjab, sugarcane is cultivated on 91,000 hectares, with an average cane yield of 80 tons per hectare and a sugar recovery of 9.59% [7]. Factors that limit yield and quality in this region are the poor use of nutrients, water stress, incidences of insect pests and disease, and poor-quality seed [8]. Of these, the unbalanced use of nutrients, and in particular of fertilizer potassium (potash), is a key challenge to achieving the potential yield of high-quality sugarcane [9].…”

“…To sustainably increase sugarcane yield and quality, a balanced use of nutrients is necessary; ignorance of the appropriate nutrient balance is likely to reduce crop yields and deplete soil health [3,6]. Potassium fertilizer is important for the metabolic and physiological activity within sugarcane plants: potassium acts as a catalyst of many enzymes, controls stomatal openings, translocates plant resources throughout the entire plant, reduces the incidence and severity of attacks by insect pests, promotes root growth, and improves the nutrient-, pesticide-and water-use efficiencies while reducing the inputs required to produce a crop [8,9]. When potassium is deficient, translocation of photosynthates [38] and their movement throughout the whole sugarcane plant are severely affected [39].…”

Spatial Analysis of Soil Available Potassium and Plant Brix Content for Site Specific Nutrient Management in Sugarcane

“…Sugarcane (Saccharum officinarum Linn) is a type of shrub that has a plant height ranging from 2 to 4 meters from the ground and requires a balanced amount of nutrition from soils and fertilizers for optimum development and growth (Bhatt, de Oliveira, & da Silva, 2021;de Oliveira et al, 2016). Besides, fertilizer on sugarcane land must avoid adverse environmental effects because sugarcane needs significant nutrition (Kusumawati & Alam, 2021;Wang et al, 2022).…”