Southern Minn Co-op Develops Model to Assist Nitrogen Management & Boost Profitability

By Chris Dunsmore, Jody Steffel & Mark Bredehoeft*

    Can the level of organic matter (OM) influence sugar percent and purity in one’s sugarbeet crop?  And, assuming it can, how might organic matter zones be mapped in order to allow growers to appropriately modify nitrogen application rates to take advantage of this relationship?
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Idaho USDA-ARS Research Aids in Work to Rein in Rhizomania, Curly Top

By Ann Perry*

    The whole point of growing sugarbeets is to produce sugar.  But once the beets are harvested and stored for processing, they slowly start to decay, which lowers their sucrose levels.
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Red River Valley Research Evaluates Impact Eight Years After Lime Application

By Carol Windels, Jason Brantner, Albert Sims & Carl Bradley*

The spreading of spent lime on sugarbeet fields around Minnesota and eastern North Dakota has increased significantly in recent years — with a primary motivation, in many instances, being to help manage Aphanomyces root rot.


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Three years of research into growing sugarbeets without irrigation in western Nebraska yielded some intriguing results.  But University of Nebraska researchers are not ready to recommend beets as a dryland crop for their region.
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Clint Hagen (left) and Michigan Sugar Co. agriculturist Matt Booms. Photo: Don Lilleboe
    In a successful sugarbeet operation, every phase of the production season is important — but none more so than a strong start and a strong finish. Brothers Clint and Brad Hagen know that as well as anyone else.  For the past decade-plus, the Hagens, who operate Atwater Farms near Ubly, Mich., have bolstered their season’s “start” by implementing a stale seedbed system.  More recently, they’ve bulked up the season’s “finish” by building huge beet carts used not only on their own farm, but also at nearby Michigan Sugar Company piling sites.
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     Chile’s beet sugar production has averaged 323,000 metric tons, raw value, over the past decade, and the sector continues to be among the world’s lowest-cost beet sugar producers.  Growth in sugar consumption has led to substantial annual imports of refined sugar, with the bulk of these imports coming from other Latin American countries, particularly Argentina.
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Crumbaughs Among Handful of Michigan Growers Employing Zone Till in Sugarbeets

Sugarbeet Stale Seedbed - The Sugarbeet Grower Magazine

Stale seedbeds — wherein fields are tilled in the fall and then left untouched the following spring until the planter rolls in — have really caught on in Michigan the past several years.  Nearly one-fourth of the state’s sugarbeet fields were planted into a stale seedbed this past season, compared to probably less than 5% just three or four years ago.
     Clay Crumbaugh is a longtime member of the stale-seedbed fraternity.  He, wife Christine and father Rex, who farm in the Breckenridge-St. Louis vicinity, have been planting beets into a stale seedbed for the past 15 years.  They began doing so on half their acreage and within three years had expanded the practice to 100% of their upcoming beet ground.  
     More recently, however, the Crumbaughs have diverted some of their sugarbeet acreage into zone (strip) till.  And it all began with a 2007 corn field.  
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British Sugar Beet Review - The Sugarbeet Grower Magazine: The Cantley Factory - British Sugar plc
Photo: British Sugar Beet Review. Above: The Cantley factory is one of four owned and operated by British Sugar plc.
Reflecting the impact of recent sugar policy reforms, the EU-27 has shifted to become one of the world’s leading sugar net-importers. The reforms are also affecting countries that benefit from preferential access to the EU market. Despite trade reforms, lower internal prices and a restructuring of the sugarbeet industry, the EU remains the world’s largest beet sugar producer
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2010 Focus Areas 03/07/2010
 
ASGA Executive Vice President Luther Markwart
Outlines Association Priorities for Coming Year
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In what areas will the American Sugarbeet Growers Association be focusing its efforts during the coming year? Luther Markwart, ASGA’s longtime executive vice president, updated members on several of the association’s top 2010 priorities during the group’s annual meeting in early February.
     • Crop Insurance — ASGA has worked for several years toward the removal of stages for sugarbeet crop insurance. That effort, which began with a pilot project in Minnesota, has now culminated in stage removal in all U.S. sugarbeet states except California (whose growers typically do not take out crop insurance on beets).
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Why the Beet Sugar Processing
Sector Is So Concerned
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This chart compares the levels of annual greenhouse gas emissions (as of 2007) that come from various industries, including sugarbeet processing. The beet sugar sector — at 4.3 million metric tons of CO2 — is very minor compared to the other noted industries, both “covered” and “not covered.”
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