Ba. Keating et al., Modelling sugarcane production systems I. Development and performance of the sugarcane module, FIELD CR RE, 61(3), 1999, pp. 253-271
Research on more productive and sustainable sugarcane production systems wo
uld be aided by a comprehensive simulator of the sugarcane crop that is cog
nisant of a broader crop-soil-management system. A sugarcane crop model is
described that can be deployed in the APSIM framework for agricultural syst
ems simulation. The model operates on a daily time step, grows a leaf canop
y, uses intercepted radiation to produce assimilate, and partitions this as
similate into leaf, structural stalk and sugar. The crop physiological proc
esses represented in the model respond to the radiation and temperature env
ironment and are sensitive to water and nitrogen supply. The model simulate
s growth, water use, N accumulation, sugar dry weight and fresh cane yield
for plant and ratoon crops in response to climate, soil, management and gen
otypic factors. The model was developed on 35 datasets from Australia, Hawa
ii, South Africa and Swaziland, covering a wide range of crop classes, lati
tudes, water regimes and nitrogen supply conditions. Coefficients of determ
ination for model predictions compared to observed data included 0.79 for L
AI, 0.93 for crop biomass, 0.83 for stalk sucrose and 0.86 for N accumulati
on in above ground tissues. The particular strengths of this model are disc
ussed in the context of agricultural systems simulation. (C) 1999 Elsevier
Science B.V. All rights reserved.