National Sugar Institute

RESEARCH ON SWEET SORGHUM AND SUGAR BEET

National Sugar Institute, Kanpur a Government of India organization has gone a step forward to cultivate Sweet Sorghum . A special site of 5 acres of land was developed for this purpose in the institute farm. The seed for this crop was procured from the National Research Centre for Sweet Sorghum, Government of India, Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh. The crop was sown in the month of July 2005. The project was carried out on the directions of Prof G K Shukla, Director by the Agriculture Chemistry Division of the institute,

Scientist examining the Sweet sorghum crop at the NSI farm.
National The sweet sorghum crop was harvested and supplied for crushing to the institutes experimental sugar factory during the current crushing season ( 2005-06). The properties of the juice are given in the table below. This juice was concentrated to 60 brix and was utilized for production of alcohol on experimental scale in the Biochemistry division.


pH	Brix	Purity	TRS
5.4	16.4	58.4	15.8%

This juice was concentrated to 60 brix and was utilized for production of alcohol on experimental scale in the Biochemistry division. Alcohol yield of 36 liters of alcohol per ton ( 90 liters per 100 liters of juice) was obtained. Using enzymatic treatment thic yield was increased to 117 liters per ton of sweet sorghum.

In additon to sweet sorghum sugar beet has also been grown in the institute farm. The cro was sown in the month of OCtober 2005 and was crushed in the current crushing season (2005 -06)