Ecology, Environment and Conservation Paper

DETERIORATION IN QUANTITY AND QUALITY OF SUGARCANE DUE TO RED ROT DISEASE

Ramesh Nath Gupta, Gireesh Chand, Amarendra Kumar, S.B. Sah and T. Saha

Abstract

Sugarcane (Saccharum officinarum L.) is an important cash crop grown in tropical and sub tropical regions of India. The productivity of sugarcane is low in India as compared to other cane growing countries of the world. Red rot disease is one of the major constraints for profitable cultivation of the crop and aptly called as cancer of sugarcane. This disease of sugarcane has adversely affected the quantitative and qualitative parameters of sugarcane. These effects seem to be somewhat directly proportional to the level of resistance of cane varieties. Maximum deterioration was found in cane variety BO102 followed by BO120, BO139 and minimum in BO130. The disease caused reduction in yield parameters like cane length (14.4-34.6% ),cane girth (5.0-23.4%), number of tillers (29.4-37.1%), number of milleable cane (35.7-50.0%) and cane yield (43.1- 52.2%). The disease also caused reduction in quality parameter like Pol (28.26-44.59%), Brix (20.04- 38.79%), Purity (17.68-31.56%), pH (0.57-1.27%), moisture in leaf (23.32- 0.03%), moisture in cane (36.25-54.84%), moisture content in juice content (7.27-15.87%), protein content in leaf (20.74-25.86%) protein content in juice (14.03- 21.29%) and commercial cane sugar (29.06-53.57%). However, content of reducing sugars (19.44- 38.70%), titrateable acidity (23.52-45.16%), gum content (20.83-34.48%) and soluble salt (27.35-46.67%) were increased due to red rot infection.