Journal of Cleaner Production 142 (2017) 1138e1147

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Journal of Cleaner Production

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An assessment of harvesting practices of sugarcane in the central

region of Thailand
Patcharaporn Pongpat a, b, Shabbir H. Gheewala a, b, *, Thapat Silalertruksa a, b
a
The Joint Graduate School of Energy and Environment (JGSEE), King Mongkut's University of Technology Thonburi (KMUTT), Bangkok, 10140, Thailand
b
Center of Excellence on Energy Technology and Environment, PERDO, Bangkok, Thailand

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Expansion of sugarcane production for satisfying food and bioenergy demands along with decreasing
Received 20 January 2016 availability of agricultural workers brings about the concerns on changing the traditional sugarcane
Received in revised form cultivation and harvesting practice to mechanization. The study aims to assess the effect on climate
22 July 2016
change impact via life cycle greenhouse gas emissions along with harvesting costs from 5 current sug-
Accepted 26 July 2016
Available online 27 July 2016
arcane harvesting practices in the central region of Thailand. The results show that harvested green cane
using cutting machines has moderate greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions as compared to the other options
but it has the highest harvesting cost due to the need for hiring cutting machines which can be quite
Keywords:
Sugarcane
expensive. Moreover, the insufficient availability of cutting machines in some areas has created a
Greenhouse gas problem of system management. This has led farmers to choose the burning of cane as per the past
Manual harvesting practice due to the ease of finding labor. Therefore, it could be recommended that the actual cost of
Mechanical harvesting mechanized harvesting and good management of cutting machine services should be considered if we
Thailand need to increase mechanical harvesting. There is no significant difference in the greenhouse gas emis-
sions of various harvesting practices as the largest greenhouse gas emissions are actually from the land
preparation stage. Even though the harvesting stage does not contribute much to the greenhouse gas
emissions, there is still an opportunity for improvement of both GHG and cost performance for which
measures are recommended. In addition, there is a need for further study on its contribution to other
impacts such as microbiological properties of the soil and local air pollution from sugarcane trash
burning.
© 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
Sugarcane is a promising crop for food and fuels in countries
located in tropical climate. Brazil is the largest sugarcane producing
country followed by India and China (FAO, 2016). Thailand is the
world's 4th largest sugarcane producer with about 96.5 and 100
Mtonne cane in 2012 and 2013, respectively (OCSB, 2014a). The
sugarcane industry is one of the major agro-industries in Thailand;
it is important to the Thai economy as it helps create income of 180
billion baht a year to the country via sugar exports and generates
jobs and employment for more than 1 million Thai rural farmers for
cultivation and harvesting of sugarcane (OCSB, 2014b). It is a
* Corresponding author. The Joint Graduate School of Energy and Environment
(JGSEE), King Mongkut's University of Technology Thonburi (KMUTT), Bangkok,
10140, Thailand.
E-mail address: shabbir_g@jgsee.kmutt.ac.th (S.H. Gheewala).
feedstock for both sugar and bioenergy production (Prasara and
Gheewala, 2015). Moreover, it is expected to be a feedstock for
producing a wide range of value-added products that go beyond
food, ethanol and bioelectricity in the future such as bioplastic,
biohydrocarbons and/or biochemicals. The plantation area and
cane production increased by 9.1% and 12.4%, respectively from
2008/09 to 2012/13 (OAE, 2014a). With an average yield of 70.2
tonne/ha, the production of sugarcane in 2013/2014 was 104
Mtonne from a total plantation area of 1.6 Mha; about 100 Mtonne
sugarcane going to the sugar mills and the remaining 4 Mtonne for
sugarcane production (OCSB, 2014c). The production of sugarcane
and sugar in Thailand is increasing recently as farmers switch from
cassava, corn and in-season rice field to sugarcane. This has resulted
in an increased demand for labor, particularly for the harvesting
process which is labor-intensive. However, currently the situation
of labor shortage is becoming a big challenge of the sugarcane
sector in Thailand because of the aging population structure of the
agriculture sector (Suwanmontri and Kawashima, 2015;

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2016.07.178
0959-6526/© 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
 P. Pongpat et al. / Journal of Cleaner Production 142 (2017) 1138e1147
Aemkulwat, 2010; Bryant and Gray, 2005). Moreover, laborers
nowadays have a lower interest for doing sugarcane harvesting
activity because it is a job requiring hard physical labor while there
is a variability of income and no welfare even for seasoned workers.
It is partly also due to the government-sanctioned minimum daily
wage that has shifted the motivation of laborers from agriculture to
industry (Kittikun, 2013). This is further aggravated by the
increasing of industrial production growth rate of Thailand
inducing the movement of labor from agriculture to industry.
Therefore, the problem of labor shortage leads to the changing of
harvesting practice where farm owners choose to burn cane before
cutting to save harvesting time and use less of labor than green
cane cutting. However, the shifting from the conventional har-
vesting to mechanization may lead to environmental problems that
need to be evaluated. The paper therefore aims to evaluate the
current sugarcane harvesting practices of sugarcane (manual and
mechanical) in the central region of Thailand with regard to life
cycle greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and harvesting costs. There
have been some studies on the environmental aspects of sugarcane
production in Thailand (Prasara and Gheewala, 2015; Yuttitham
et al., 2012; and Sornpoon et al., 2014), life cycle cost
(Silalertruksa et al., 2012) and the cost related to sugarcane pro-
duction provided by the government office and researchers (OCSB,
2015a,b; OAE, 2014a,b; Nguyen and Gheewala, 2008b). The life
cycle climate change impact and cost on harvesting stage are
focused in the paper as it is the main process that needs much labor.
It will also consider the effect of different harvesting practices to
improve labor hiring and consequently sustainability of sugarcane
harvesting.
2. Materials and methods
In the study, primary data were collected using questionnaires
by face to face interviews with sugarcane growers and laborers
working in the farms. Questionnaires for sugarcane production
consisted of both quantitative and qualitative data such as general
information about farm owners and laborers, input-output of the
production process, harvesting process, waste management,
employment, production cost, wages for laborers and working
hours. Meanwhile, the secondary data such as life cycle inventory
(LCI) of raw materials and energy that were used in the sugarcane
plantation system were accessed from the Thai National LCI data-
base, peer-reviewed literature, government offices and private
companies' public documents. The varieties of fertilizers used in
the field were converted to N, P, K. Sugarcane trash; dry matter
fraction and residue burned were analyzed using emission factors
sourced from Nguyen and Gheewala (2008a), Yuttitham et al.
(2012) and the Thailand Greenhouse Gas Management Organiza-
tion (Public Organization) (TGO, 2014). The data were collected
during December 2013 for one cropping year 2013/2014.
2.1. Sugarcane production system in central region of Thailand
Data were collected in the Central region of Thailand which is
the second largest region of sugarcane (OCSB, 2014c) and has the
highest production cost (OCSB, 2015a,b). The data were collected
via direct survey from 88 sugarcane growers in Suphanburi, Kan-
chanaburi, Uthaithani and Chainat provinces (49, 14, 17 and 8
farmers respectively). The sugarcane production system in this
study covers land preparation, planting, cultivation, and the har-
vesting process as shown in Fig. 1. Land preparation is fully
mechanized and conducted to prepare the soil for planting cane via
ploughing by ripper, 2e3 times of disk ploughing and disk har-
rowing. Land levelling is needed for providing irrigation water
supply. Layout of fields to make furrows is also important for
1139
mechanized harvesting; there is a minimum space requirement of
155e165 cm for furrows (OCSB, 2014b). However, land preparation
is related to the plantation season; there are 2 main periods for
sugarcane land preparation and planting. First, the rainy season for
which the clearing of land is done around April to June and har-
vesting around February to March. In this period, water is needed
since the beginning of planting and is mostly used in the Central
region. Second, end of the rainy season for which land clearing
starts around October to November and harvesting around
November to February. This period is mostly used in the North-
eastern region where there is not much water. It is related to depth
of furrow that would affect land preparation and plantation costs.
However, cultivation practices for each province are consistent
within the same sub district in each province. Therefore, the main
cultivation practices for each province were set as representative
practices as shown in Table 1. Planting is mostly mechanized (Billet
planter) with only 17% of the surveyed farms still using the manual
technique in areas with small farms. Around 80% of farms use
different chemical fertilizers; some farms use both chemical and
organic fertilizers as the starter fertilizer. Also filter cake and
vinasse from the sugar factory are used as a soil conditioner before
planting. For sugarcane cultivation, fertilizers are required. Chem-
ical fertilizer types used in sugarcane production vary by area as
shown in Table 1. The frequency of fertilizer application is around
1e2 times per year after sugarcane tillering. The amount of
chemical fertilizers is varied between 156 and 625 kg/ha. Pesticides
are used in some small areas. Farmers use herbicides covering all
zones of their farms though some zones depend on manual
weeding. Around 10% of the studied areas have irrigation so that
farmers could apply water to their farm after planting. Other farms
depend on rain and underground water. Harvesting begins 10e14
months after planting and the sugarcane has more than 10 CCS
(Commercial Cane Sugar, a measure of total sugar content in the
cane which determined from pol, brix and fiber content in the
variety of cane). After harvesting, most farmers plow around 2e3
times by small tractors to get rid of weeds and the remaining cane
trash in the field (Prasara and Gheewala, 2015); some areas burn
sugarcane trash instead of tillage as it is easier and cheaper than
using tractor.
2.2. Sugarcane harvesting technologies
There are two types of sugarcane harvesting methods currently
used: (1) Manual harvesting and (2) Mechanical harvesting.
Manual harvesting is mostly used in small and medium farms.
Usually owners of large farms use their own machines or service
machines which are supported by the sugar factories. For har-
vesting operation, burning sugarcane to remove leaves and other
matters is still popular as burnt cane can be more easily cut by la-
borers and it is easier to find laborers to cut burnt fields. The ca-
pacity of harvesting depends on the field conditions before the
operation such as burned or unburned cane, species, sugarcane age,
and soil quality. There are 5 harvesting practices used in the studied
area; A) fully manual harvesting using labor for cutting green cane
B) fully manual harvesting using labor for cutting burnt cane C)
semi-mechanized harvesting by using labor to cut green cane and
using grab loader to transfer cane to truck D) semi-mechanized
harvesting by using labor to cut burnt cane and using grab loader
to transfer cane to truck and E) fully mechanized harvesting. The
details of each harvesting practice are shown in Table 2. Mostly, the
farmers in the studied area choose to burn cane before harvesting
as it is easy to find laborers, even though green cane has a better
price than burnt cane. The laborers also prefer burnt cane because
the amount of burnt cane they can harvest is more than green cane
for the same number of working hours which increases their daily
1140 P. Pongpat et al. / Journal of Cleaner Production 142 (2017) 1138e1147

Land preparation
• Ripping
• Tillage
• Ploughing
• Land level
• Ridging

Mechanization Planting
Input
- Seed
Resources

- Materials
- Fertilizer Cultivation
- Agrochemicals • Manual or machine pesticides apply
- Water • Machine for water supplement
- Energy carries

Harvesting
• Fully manual: labor cutting green cane
• Fully manual: labor cutting burnt cane
• Semi-mechanized: cutting green cane using Direct emissions
grab cane loader from field
• Semi-mechanized: cutting burnt cane using
grab cane loader
• Fully mechanized Solid waste &
waste water

Product: 1 tonne sugarcane

Fig. 1. System boundary for sugarcane production under the study.

Table 1
Sugarcane production practices under this study.

Suphanburi Kanchanaburi Uthaithani Chainat

Main specie KhonKaen 3 LK92-11 KhonKaen3 LK92-11 KhonKaen3 KhonKaen3 LK92-11

Average growing area (ha) 3433.3 445.8 267.0 81.3
Average yield (tonne/ha/yr) 68 66 67 72
Average CCS 10.5 10.2 10.5 10.1
Average no. of harvest before replanting 3 3 3 3
Average no. of tillage in land preparation before planting 2 2 3 3
Planting practice Machine Machine Machine Machine
Main water consumption Rain Rain Rain Rain
Main chemical fertilizer type used in planting 16:16:8 16:16:8 15:15:15 15:15:15
Organic fertilizer in planting Yes Yes Yes Yes
Vinasse and filter cake in planting Yes Yes No No
Main chemical fertilizer type used in maintenance 46:0:0 46:0:0 16:16:8 16:16:8
Pesticide in maintenance Yes Yes Yes Yes
Gasoline in pesticide spraying Yes Yes Yes Yes
Fuel used in cultivation process Yes Yes Yes Yes
Average no. of fertilization/yr 2 1 1 2
Average no. of herbicide application/yr 1 1 1 1
Average no. of pesticide application/yr 1 1 1 1

income. The survey results summarized in Table 2 show that about
42% of farmers chose to harvest sugarcane by cutting burnt cane by
hand and used grab cane loader (Case D: Semi-mechanized Burnt
Cane). Although the Category E: Fully mechanized method was
used by only 14% of the total farmers, it was noticed from the survey
that several farmers are interested to use mechanization for the
next crop.
The use of cutting machines for harvesting is being increased
although the hiring of cutting machine services generally requires
certain conditions that may not be suitable for an individual small-
scale farmer in Thailand. The conditions for efficient and econom-
ical use of cutting machine are as follows: the sugarcane field must
be larger than 1.6 ha, yield must be more than 62.5 tonne/ha,
minimum space between furrows is 155e165 cm, planting must be
in straight rows, flat ground and turning space must be available for
the cutting machines. Therefore, for hiring the cutting machines,
sugarcane farmers have to plan since the beginning. For example,
small farms need to form groups to reach the minimum area
requirement. Nevertheless, some farmers avoid using cutting ma-
chines as they would like to make a space between furrows nar-
rower than 150 cm to get more sugarcane. Meanwhile, sugarcane
farmers who do not have their own cutting machine have to use the
service from the sugarcane factory or hire private cutting machines
from other farmers which can be expensive. Harvesting capacity is
 P. Pongpat et al. / Journal of Cleaner Production 142 (2017) 1138e1147 1141

Table 2
Type of sugarcane harvesting in the central region of Thailand at harvesting year 2013/2014.

Parameter Type of harvesting

A: Fully manual B: Fully manual C: Semi- D: Semi-mechanized E: Fully mechanized

mechanized

Green cane Burnt cane Green cane Burnt cane

System Whole chain by hand cutting and Hand cutting and Hand cutting with Hand cutting with Mechanical cutting of stalks and tops, and
features loading loading burnt cane mechanical grab mechanical grab burnt direct sending to truck
green cane loading cane loading
Operating - Manual harvesting using cutting - Manual harvesting - Manual - Manual harvesting - Chopper harvester is used for double
principle knife. The green cane stalks are using cutting knife. harvesting using using cutting knife. horizontal discs for base cutting. The
cut nearly at the soil surface and at The burnt cane stalks cutting knife for The burnt cane stalks chopper cuts at a rate of about 42 t per
least 25e30 cm from top are cut nearly at the green cane are cut nearly at the hour. Sugarcane stalks are cut into 12e14
- Manual cane loading used to load soil surface - Mechanical grab soil surface inch billets and loaded into trucks by using
the harvested sugarcane stalks - Manual cane loading loading requires - Mechanical grab a loading elevator, mounted on the
into trucks; this requires 2e3 requires 2e3 2 laborers: for loading requires 2 chopper. Leaf and other matter are
laborers: for truck, loading and laborers: on truck, driving and land laborers: for driving removed by fan system on the field
land clearing loading and land clearing and land clearing
clearing
% farmers 18% 20% 6% 42% 14%
using the
harvesting
method in
the studied
area
Harvesting 1e1.5 tonne/man/day 1.5e2 tonne/man/day 1e1.5 tonne/man/ 1.5e2.5 tonne/man/day 200-300 tonne/machine/day
capacity: day
Cutting
Harvesting 1.5 tonne/man/day 2 tonne/man/day 10 tonne/machine/ 12 tonne/machine/day
capacity: day
Loading
Yield (tonne 67.5 66.8 66.9 67.0 69.0
cane/ha)
CCS 10.2 10.7 10.7 10.3 10.5
Cost (Cutting 200 190 165 160 215
and
loading)
(THB/tonne
cane)
Main - Lack of labor, need labor from - Air quality and - Need for training and labor to operate and - Need bigger furrow
restrictions other areas such as north and visibility related to maintain machine - Plantation are more than 0.8 ha for service
northeast smoke from cane cutting machine of government office and
- Need for training to maintain burning 1.6 ha for sugar factory and private
quality and productivity that - Environmental machine
would affect to make green cane impact - Smooth and no stony land
harvesting more costly - Deal with the health - Average sugarcane yield more than 62.5
- Mostly is female labor (Range of effects tonne cane/ha
age 35e49) - Lower product cost
Advantages - Better quality (e.g. lower soil - Lower cost of - Reduced labor in grabbing cane - Reduced labor (only in operation and
content) production - Safe time maintenance)
- Lower raw material losses - More efficient - Easy to operating and transportation - Easy harvesting operations
- Avoids the setup of operation and harvesting of - Makes green cane harvesting feasible
maintenance machines sugarcane in the field - Increase productivity of cutting and
- Decreases the volume transporting operations
of materials to be
processed by the
factories

also an important factor related to cane quality and price as cane
cut by the laborers should be transferred to the factory within 1e2
days and cane cut by machine should be transferred within 24 h.
Many areas with manual harvesting use temporary laborers by
direct contact or service of contractors who not only harvest the
cane, but include loading and transportation services. The main
reason for using contractors is to avoid labor shortage problems
even though their service is more expensive than direct contact.
Most laborers are temporary employees that come from other re-
gions, especially from the northeast and they mostly own rice fields
but work in the sugarcane farms for extra income (Prasara and
Gheewala, 2015).
Wages for harvesting laborers depends on the agreement be-
tween the farm owners and laborers. Some owners pay for labor
per day or per activities as Thai baht (THB) per binder [1 USD ¼ 35.2
THB], THB per tonne cane or THB per area (rai) [1 ha ¼ 6.25 rai]. As
this is temporary employment, welfare is not provided to the la-
borers but the owner is responsible for medical fees. For some
cases, food and transportation for the laborers is also included.
Average working hours are 7e9 h/day. The laborers start early in
the morning, then break at noon for around 1.5e2 h and finish work
around late afternoon. Harvesting equipment is provided for la-
borers in some farms. Loading machines require 2e3 laborers for
driving and land clearing. Hiring cost depends on area or capacity.
Most farmers in this survey had their own loading machines which
they operated themselves. As for the cutting machine, farmers who
do not own such machines could use the service from the sugar
factory or other farmers. The factory makes a list of farmers and
1142 P. Pongpat et al. / Journal of Cleaner Production 142 (2017) 1138e1147

gives priority to farms that have the best quality of sugarcane. For  For land clearing, only direct land use change is considered in
private machine service, the prioritization depends on the location the assessment. Indirect land use change is not taken into ac-
of the sugarcane field. The cutting machines are generally used for count in the study as there is still no consensual method to
cutting green cane. However, in some cases, cutting machines are assess the consequential impacts of land use change. The direct
also used to cut burnt cane for example, if the farmer already land use changed method follows IPCC (2006) associated with
burned the cane but laborers skip work. Then the owner must look annual change in carbon stock in biomass, in dead wood of litter,
for a cutting machine as it is the fastest operation to maintain cane in soil and annual GHG emission from land clearing i.e. removal
quality. of vegetation by fire in unit of tonne CO2-eq/ha/yr. The
assumption of amortization period used is 20 years.
 Materials used in the field are fuel, electricity, fertilizer and
2.3. Life cycle greenhouse gas emissions from sugarcane production
agrochemicals; primary data for all materials were collected
from farmers using questionnaires and the average amounts of
In this study, life cycle GHG emissions are evaluated based on
inputs were calculated by weighted-average method based on
the reference flow of 1 tonne of newly planted sugarcane at farm
area. Fossil fuels are used in the field, mainly for land prepara-
gate. The scope of the study includes land preparation, planting,
tion and planting. Data were collected for both chemical and
cultivation and harvesting stage. The residues and trash burning in
organic fertilizers and converted to nutrients as nitrogen (N),
sugarcane field were excluded as this study assumes that the res-
phosphorus (P2O5) and potassium (K2O). Farmers in the studied
idues and trash were managed by tractor in land preparation stage.
areas mostly used urea in land preparation; meanwhile, the
The general formula for the life cycle GHG emissions of sugarcane
cultivation stage used complex fertilizers like 15-15-15, 21-0-
production is as follows:
0 and 16-20-0 around 250e375 kg/ha/year. The organic fertil-
izers such as chicken, pig and cow manure were applied at about
GHGTotal ¼ GHGLU þ GHGma þ GHGfield
500e625 kg/ha/year mostly used in the cultivation stage.
However, the amount of fertilizers used would be decreased for
GHGSC ¼ GHGTotal/ASC
ratoon cane as the farmers will only use plough for mounding
ratoon cane and apply fertilizers at around 150e185 kg/ha/year.
GHGTotal represents the total GHG emissions from the entire life
Agrochemical such as pesticides i.e. ametryn, paraquat, glyph-
cycle of sugarcane production (kg CO2-eq/year). GHGLU is the
osate and atrazine are used when sugarcane age is around 1e4
annualized GHG emissions from C-Stock changes caused by land-
months. The average amounts of pesticide used are around
use change and management of land clearance before cultivation.
3.1e4.7 kg/ha/year (0.17 kg active ingredient). The GHG emis-
GHGma represents the GHG emissions from the production of input
sions from production of materials and chemicals used are
materials including fuel, electricity, fertilizers and agrochemicals.
estimated by multiplying the amount of each material with its
GHGfield represents the GHG emissions occurring during the culti-
GHG emission factors. The scope of GHG emissions calculations
vation activities e.g. N2O emissions from applied fertilizers and
and assumptions used are as follows:
GHG emissions from combustion of fuels in agricultural machinery.
 Emissions in the field from fuel combustion in agricultural
GHGSC represents the total GHG emissions of sugarcane production
machines and equipment are calculated from the amount of fuel
per tonne cane (kg CO2-eq/tonne cane). ASC is the total amount of
multiplied by emission factor for combustion of each fuel.
sugarcane produced in one year (tonne/year).
 Emissions from fertilizers applied in the fields will also cause the
The GHGs considered include CO2 and non-CO2 e.g. N2O and CH4
non-CO2 GHG emissions e.g. N2O from N-fertilizers, which have
emissions. The impact of the non-CO2 GHGs are expressed in terms
also been accounted. The calculation was based on IPCC (2006)
of the equivalent amount of CO2 (CO2-eq). The characterization
method which include both direct and indirect emissions (IPCC,
factors for converting N2O and CH4 emissions into CO2-eq are
2006). The details are in the supplementary materials.
referred from IPCC guidelines (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate
 Estimation of nitrogen through leaching and runoff using IPCC
Change, 2006), and correspond to a 100 year timeframe; GWPs
(2006) and Nevison (2000). The details are in the supplemen-
used for CO2, CH4, and N2O are 1, 25, 298 kgCO2-eq/kg of substance,
tary material.
respectively (IPCC, 2006). The GHG emissions sources considered in
the assessment are as follows and shown in Table 3:

Table 3
Data requirement and data sources for LCI analysis.

Type of List of data used Data source

data

Primary  Land clearing/land use changed Interview & Questionnaire (QN)

data  Sugarcane seedling used
 Chemical and organic fertilizer used (N:
P2O5: K2O)
 Agrochemicals used
 Fuel used for agricultural machine
 Electricity used for agricultural machine
 Water supplement
Secondary  Land use changed
data  Emission factors for calculating GHG
emissions
 Emission from fertilizer applied
 Emissions from fuel combustion (CO2, CH4,
N2O and non-GHG)
 Direct and indirect N2O from fertilizer
used
 Emission from sugarcane residues burning
Interview & QN
Interview & QN
Interview & QN
Interview & QN
Interview, QN and calculated
Interview & QN and calculated
Calculated based on IPCC (2006)
Emission factor for carbon footprint product by Thailand Greenhouse Gas Management Organization (Public
Organization: TGO) (2016) and Ecoinvent Database
Guideline for LCI of agricultural products (MTEC, 2013)
Calculated based on IPCC (2006) and EEA (2009)
Calculated based on “Good Practice Guidance and Uncertainty Management in National Greenhouse Gas
Inventories” in IPCC (2006)
Calculated based on IPCC (2006)
 P. Pongpat et al. / Journal of Cleaner Production 142 (2017) 1138e1147
 Estimation of P via runoff followed Nemecek and Ka €gi (2007)
and the formula is provided in the supplementary material.
The P runoff to surface water is estimated from the P-fertilizer
used. Using quantity of P lost through runoff to rivers (default
0.175 kg P/(ha-yr)) for open arable land multiplied with
correction factor for the quantity of P-fertilizer contained in
mineral fertilizers, slurry or liquid sewage sludge and solid
manure.
 Cane burning in harvesting stage is calculated from the com-
bustion of organic matter. Factors used for the calculation are as
follows: the average yield is around 67 tonne/ha; sugarcane
residue to crop ratio is about 0.30; the fraction of trash burning
in the field is 0.30 and the burning efficiency is 90%. This brings
about the average residue mass available for combustion to 6.3
tonne of sugarcane residue per hectare. The emission factors
related to sugarcane residues burning following IPCC (2006) are
2.7 gCH4/kg dry matter burnt and 0.07 gN2O/kg dry matter
burnt.
The GHG emissions results are assessed in units of kgCO2-eq/
tonne cane and kgCO2-eq/ha to consider the statistically significant
relationships between GHG and harvesting practices as well as the
influencing factors.
3. Results and discussion
The life cycle greenhouse gas emissions for different harvesting
practices and recommendations for sugarcane production
improvement are discussed in the sections below.
3.1. Life cycle greenhouse gas emissions of sugarcane production
The life cycle greenhouse gas emissions are shown along with
the other life cycle inventory items in Table 4 as input and output
data used in this study. There are 5 categories of harvesting prac-
tices (as enunciated in Table 2); Fig. 1 shows the relative contri-
bution of different stages to GHG emissions. As can be seen from
Table 5, the harvesting practices do not affect the inventory results
significantly. The slight variation in the sugarcane seed data is
because in the period of data collection, most farmers in case (A)
had new plantings whereas those in the other cases were mostly
using ratoons. As mentioned before, most farmers do not want to
wait for filter cake and vinasse from the sugar mills. However, the
farmers in case (A) are small holders and did not mind waiting to
receive these.
From Fig. 2, the major GHG emissions source is the N2O emis-
sions from the applied N-fertilizer in the field in the cultivation
process contributing 25e35% of the total GHG emissions of sugar-
cane followed by the GHG emissions from the fertilizers production
(particularly N-fertilizer) which accounts for about 15e20% of the
total GHG emissions. The fuel consumption as diesel used in the
field is mostly for land preparation and harvesting process ac-
counting for 10e20% of the total GHG emissions. Organic fertilizers
such as manure, filter cake and vinasse were also used in the field
but only in small amounts. Filter cake and vinasse are provided for
free by some sugar mills and transported by the farmers when they
transfer cane from field to factory. As farmers need to save time to
transfer sugarcane in the next trip, they only collect the filter cake
and vinasse in the last trip. The chemicals used in the field did not
contribute much to the overall GHG emissions as farmers used
these only in some small areas as there were no pests and diseases
in studied year. GHG emissions in the harvesting process accounted
for around 20% of the total GHG emissions in burnt cane harvesting.
Table 5 shows the GHG emissions per tonne of sugarcane clas-
sified by the different processes and the different production
1143
stages. The highest GHG emissions (i.e. around 70%) resulted from
the fertilizers production and application in cultivation stage. The
second highest emissions come from land use change and land
preparation (9%). However, this amount of emission is only for the
first crop; not in the later ratoons (i.e. usually one sugarcane crop is
followed by 3 ratoons before being replanted). Hence, the GHG
emission from the land preparation stage would be reduced in the
next ratoon cane plantation. The planting stage contributes least
GHG emissions as compared to other stages. About 90% of the
farmers use their own planting machine. For the harvesting stage,
an anticipated significant difference was observed in the GHG
emissions between the different harvesting practices. The differ-
ences arose particularly between manual and mechanized har-
vesting as well as green cane and burnt cane. However, the
contributions of the harvesting to the overall GHG emissions from
the sugarcane production are modest. Thus, the GHG emissions
from sugarcane production are ultimately not significantly
different. Also, there are other impact categories such as microbi-
ological properties of the soil, acidification (emissions to air in term
of NOx, SO2), photochemical oxidant formation (emissions to air in
terms of NOx, CO) and particulate matter formation (in term of
particulates, NOx, SO2) that may also need to be considered.
Including another important environmental consideration is the
water resources requirement which can have a considerable effect
on sugarcane yield. This needs to be further studied particularly for
its effect on economically viable production. Moreover, the per-
formance of cutting machines should be considered further as the
average capacity of cutting machines in Thailand at 3e5 ha/day is
low compared to Brazil and Australia (4e18 ha/day) (Sugar
Research Australia, 2014). GHG emissions from sugarcane produc-
tion in southern Brazil have been reported to be around 26.5 kg
CO2eq/tonne sugarcane (the emissions shared by residues burning
44%, fertilizer used 20% and combustion of fossil fuel 18%
(Figueiredo et al., 2010)). The GHG emissions of sugarcane in
Argentina which also included mechanical harvesting and cutting
burnt cane by hand were around 28e34 kg CO2eq/tonne sugarcane
(Acreche et al., 2014) which corroborate well with the results of this
study.
3.2. Manual and mechanical harvesting cost
Sugarcane production costs are mainly from labor (40% of total
production cost), materials such as sugarcane seed and fertilizers
(38% of total production cost), and fixed costs such as land rental
(12% of total production cost). The total labor costs for new cane
planting and ratoon cane planting are about 13,800 and 500 Baht/
hectare, respectively. The lower labor cost for ratoon cane planting
because it does not require the labor for land preparation. Hence,
the labor costs for harvesting contribute about 43% and 67% of the
total labor costs for the new cane and ratoon cane planting,
respectively. Therefore, harvesting cost is the hotspot for farmers
who need to reduce the expenses. As mentioned in Section 2.3,
even though farmers may want to reduce the expenses for labor via
shifting to mechanical harvesting; however, there are several
constraints that hinder farmers from access to machines. Thus,
manual labor must still be relied on. Additionally, due to the labor
shortage, the cost can be quite high but the farmers do not really
have a choice. Harvesting cost for labor is accounted in various ways
such as THB/day, THB/tonne, THB/binder or THB/ha. Mostly farmers
use binders to calculate the wage for labor as 0.5e0.7 TH B/binder
for burnt cane and 1.5e2 TH B/binder for green cane (10e16 stalks/
binder). For permanent laborers however, the harvesting costs are
usually in THB/day or depending on activity which would be agreed
upon in advance. For, green cane cutting using the service of con-
tractors or cutting machines, the wages are usually calculated in
1144 P. Pongpat et al. / Journal of Cleaner Production 142 (2017) 1138e1147

Table 4
Life cycle inventory used in this study per tonne of sugarcane.

A: Fully manual B: Fully manual C: Semi-mechanized D: Semi-mechanized E: Fully mechanized

Green cane Burnt cane Green cane Burnt cane

Land preparation
Land use (m2.yr) 1.48Eþ02 1.50Eþ02 1.50Eþ02 1.49Eþ02 1.45Eþ02
Diesel (L) 7.37E-01 8.14E-01 8.08E-01 8.26E-01 8.26E-01
N fertilizer (kg) 1.48E-01 3.69E-03 2.12E-01 5.50E-02 3.68E-02
P2O5 fertilizer (kg) 2.81E-01 3.69E-03 0.00Eþ00 9.12E-03 4.60E-02
K2O fertilizer (kg) 3.04E-01 3.69E-03 1.79E-01 2.18E-02 0.00Eþ00
Organic fertilizer: N fertilizer (kg) 0.00Eþ00 0.00Eþ00 0.00Eþ00 0.00Eþ00 0.00Eþ00
Organic fertilizer: P2O5 fertilizer (kg) 0.00Eþ00 0.00Eþ00 0.00Eþ00 0.00Eþ00 0.00Eþ00
Organic fertilizer: K2O fertilizer (kg) 0.00Eþ00 0.00Eþ00 0.00Eþ00 0.00Eþ00 0.00Eþ00
Filter cake (kg) 8.52E-02 0.00Eþ00 3.74E-02 9.33E-03 0.00Eþ00
Vinasse (kg) 2.12E-01 0.00Eþ00 0.00Eþ00 2.80E-02 0.00Eþ00
Plantation
Sugarcane seed (kg) 2.00Eþ01 1.40Eþ01 8.00Eþ00 1.40Eþ01 1.40Eþ01
Diesel (L) 4.00E-01 4.84E-01 3.81E-01 4.75E-01 4.19E-01
Cultivation
N fertilizer (kg) 1.93Eþ00 2.23Eþ00 1.96Eþ00 2.13Eþ00 2.13Eþ00
P2O5fertilizer (kg) 7.05E-01 7.74E-01 9.45E-01 1.05Eþ00 8.07E-01
K2O fertilizer (kg) 4.97E-01 4.97E-01 2.82E-01 7.55E-01 5.84E-01
Organic fertilizer: N fertilizer (kg) 2.43E-02 8.07E-02 2.00E-02 6.96E-03 0.00Eþ00
Organic fertilizer: P2O5 fertilizer (kg) 9.82E-03 3.77E-02 1.90E-02 3.35E-03 0.00Eþ00
Organic fertilizer: K2O fertilizer (kg) 1.72E-02 7.81E-02 1.15E-02 6.68E-03 0.00Eþ00
Filter cake (kg) 9.20E-01 0.00Eþ00 4.00E-01 1.00E-01 0.00Eþ00
Vinasse (kg) 2.29Eþ00 0.00Eþ00 0.00Eþ00 3.00E-01 0.00Eþ00
Diesel (L) 8.86E-02 1.56E-01 2.85E-01 2.38E-01 2.77E-01
Gasoline (L) 3.13E-02 7.29E-02 8.52E-02 1.13E-01 1.35E-01
Electricity (kWh) 1.53E-01 1.36E-02 1.28E-01 2.58E-01 1.46E-01
Pesticide (kg) 1.94E-01 3.36E-01 2.60E-01 3.11E-01 1.42E-01
Ground water (m3) 2.93Eþ00 1.37Eþ00 2.23E-01 2.36Eþ00 1.45E-01
Surface water (m3) 2.96Eþ00 5.60E-01 8.37E-01 3.54E-01 2.81Eþ00
Harvesting
Diesel (for mechanized harvesting) (L) 0.00Eþ00 0.00Eþ00 0.00Eþ00 0.00Eþ00 5.44E-01
Diesel (for mechanized loading) (L) 0.00Eþ00 0.00Eþ00 1.87E-01 1.87E-01 0.00Eþ00
Outputa
Emissions to air
CO2 (kg) 3.37Eþ00 4.08Eþ00 4.67Eþ00 4.90Eþ00 5.87Eþ00
CH4 (kg) 2.64E-04 4.03E-04 4.66E-04 5.45E-04 6.52E-04
N2O (kg) 1.28E-03 1.52E-03 1.74E-03 1.80E-03 2.16E-03
NH3 (kg) 8.43E-06 1.01E-05 1.15E-05 1.21E-05 1.45E-05
NMVOC (kg) 3.91E-03 5.11E-03 5.86E-03 6.41E-03 7.67E-03
NOx (kg) 3.67E-02 4.37E-02 4.99E-02 5.20E-02 6.23E-02
SO2 (kg) 3.73E-04 4.52E-04 5.16E-04 5.43E-04 6.50E-04
Direct N2O emission from N-fertilizer used (kg) 3.30E-02 3.64E-02 3.44E-02 3.44E-02 3.41E-02
NH3 from fertilizer used (kg) 1.76E-01 1.95E-01 1.84E-01 1.84E-01 1.82E-01
NMVOC from fertilizer used (kg) 1.25E-08 1.38E-08 1.30E-08 1.30E-08 1.29E-08
NOx from fertilizer used (kg) 6.93E-03 7.65E-03 7.22E-03 7.22E-03 7.16E-03
Indirect N2O emission (kg) 1.34E-02 1.48E-02 1.39E-02 1.39E-02 1.38E-02
Emissions to water
Nitrogen through leaching and runoff (kg) 4.20E-01 4.63E-01 4.38E-01 4.38E-01 4.34E-01
P through runoff (kg) 3.29E-02 3.31E-02 3.32E-02 3.31E-02 3.21E-02
a
Excluding emissions from field burning before harvesting.

Table 5
GHG emissions from different stages of sugarcane production (kg CO2eq/tonne sugarcane).

A: Fully manual B: Fully manual C: Semi-mechanized D: Semi-mechanized E: Fully mechanized

Green cane Burnt cane Green cane Burnt cane

Land preparation and land use change 5.5 3.8 5.9 4.3 4.2
Planting 1.3 1.6 1.3 1.6 1.4
Cultivation 22.4 26.9 24.2 26.3 24.8
Harvesting 0.0 8.4 0.6 9.0 1.8
Total (range) 29.2 (18e40) 40.6 (31e45) 31.9 (20e42) 41.2 (32e50) 32.1 (22e41)

THB/tonne cane or THB/ha. In this study, the harvesting costs are
presented in all units for comparison purposes.
The harvesting costs vary considerably among the 5 categories
(Table 2). The cost for labor to cut green cane is higher than burnt
cane because of the difficulty in harvesting. Some farmers have
their own cutting machines but they still have to employ a driver
and 2e3 laborers to operate the cutting machine. Farmers who do
not own cutting machines would be hiring the machines from other
farmers or the sugarcane company for which they have to spend
more money. The switching from manual to mechanized sugarcane
harvesting should be considered further, especially for small farms.
The current constraint for Thailand in terms of breakeven area of
 P. Pongpat et al. / Journal of Cleaner Production 142 (2017) 1138e1147
(E) Green
Mechanical
(D) Manual:
Semi Burnt cane
(C) Manual:
Semi Green cane
(B) Manual:
Whole Burnt
cane
(A) Manual:
Whole Green
cane
0% 10% 20% 30%
Land use changed
Chemical: P2O5 fertilizer
Organic: N fertilizer
Organic: K2O fertilizer
Indirect N2O emission from N-fertilizer used
Gasoline and gasoline combustion
Pesticide
Surface water
Fig. 2. Average GHG emissions for different cultivation practices (kg CO2eq/tonne sugarcane).
mechanical use is that the farm area should be more than 0.8 ha as
per government recommendations (OAE, 2014b) while sugar fac-
tories or private hiring requires a minimum of 1.6 ha. The machine
hiring rate is 185e250 TH B/tonne cane and the average capacity of
cutting machine is 3.2e4.8 ha/day. However, cooperation/grouping
of nearby farms could be a way to address the constraint of area
limitation. Moreover, for applying mechanical harvesting, the
planning of cultivation should be done in advance to ensure
appropriate row spacing and land smoothening which can other-
wise adversely affect harvester performance.
The transition from agriculture to manufacturing has led to the
sugarcane industry facing a labor shortage problem, thus giving
more negotiating power to the laborers regarding harvesting prac-
tice and wages. This affects the farm owners so that they have to find
new strategies to counter labor shortage with expense saving
methods, especially the medium size farms that could not make
production only by self-employment. Small farms mostly use
manual practices since land preparation to harvesting by hiring
household members and relatives. It seems that the small farmers
might not face the problem of labor shortage but this is not really a
long term solution for sugarcane production. However, small farm
have less negotiation power; so they may consider making groups of
small sugarcane producers and also adapting their management
system to the context. This study has shown that the hiring system
(labor and cutting machine) in harvesting process is a big proportion
of the sugarcane production cost. However, there are more factors
related to harvesting practice which must also be investigated.
Usually, about 25e35 persons are required to finish sugarcane
harvesting in same time as a cutting machine. Even then the labor
hiring cost is cheaper than renting cutting machine by almost 10%.
3.3. Factors affecting harvesting practices
The results of 5 harvesting practices for sugarcane in Thailand
are considered in terms of GHG emissions and labor hiring cost. It
can be seen that the cheapest labor cost is possible by burning cane
and using loading machines. However, harvesting practice does not
really affect the average yield and CCS (Berry et al., 2007). These are
affected by different factors such as choice of fertilizer application,
water supply, soil quality, land, species and climate in different
areas (Prasara and Gheewala, 2015). From the interviews, labor
conditions do not affect productivity but would affect harvesting
time which might result in sucrose loss in sugarcane (Lontom et al.,
2009; Verma et al., 2012). Work and field conditions such as stony
1145
40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%
Chemical: N fertilizer
Chemical: K2O fertilizer
Organic: P2O5 fertilizer
Direct N2O emission from N-fertilizer used
Diesel and diesel combustion
Electricity
Ground water
Cane burning
ground and steepness can result in a significant difference in har-
vesting practices and have a negative impact on both labor and
cutting machines (Meyer and Fenwick, 2003; Renouf and Wegener,
2007; Capaz et al., 2013). Even though the harvesting cost has a
significant role in the total production cost, but the differences in
harvesting practices have very little effect on the overall production
cost. However, harvesting practice and labor conditions are still
important in terms of environmental and social impacts. Although
using cutting machine has the highest hiring cost, it is still the best
choice to address the labor shortage problem which occurred in
many farms. The sugar factory and government also try to promote
the cutting machine to farmers by measures such as the sugar
factory providing priority to dump green cane to the crushing
process and the government providing soft loan to farmers who
need to buy cutting machine and other machines. Nevertheless,
four farmers (covering around 115 ha) in the survey using the
private cutting machine had higher rental costs because the cutting
machines provided by the sugar factory were not sufficient.
Farmers therefore could not wait and chose to use the service from
private cutting machine to maintain sugar quality.
3.4. Recommendations
Recommendations on Good Agricultural Practices that would
help improve the GHG and cost performances in the life cycle of
sugarcane production system are as follows:
 Land management: the farmers should check the quality of soil
before planting or every 3 years to follow up the soil nutrients
which will benefit to farmer for selecting the suitable fertilizers
and applying them in the appropriate amounts during the
cultivation stage. Moreover, the crop rotation e.g. legumes and
millet could help to improve the soil quality (LDD, 2014).
 Land preparation stage: for new cane planting, ploughing is first
done to open land surface; organic fertilizers are applied to the
field and the land exposed for 2e4 weeks. Then crosswise
ploughing is done to crush the soil. The ridge is the last step for
land preparation with space between furrows around
110e155 cm. For ratoon cane, first ploughing between furrows is
needed to activate cane growth (DOA, 2014).
 Plantation stage: suitable cane species is the most important.
The farmer should clarify on the species that are good for
planting in their areas.
1146 P. Pongpat et al. / Journal of Cleaner Production 142 (2017) 1138e1147
 Cultivation stage: this stage affects the environment and eco-
nomics the most. The farmers should choose the type and
amount of fertilizers to apply to the land based on soil quality
tests which indicate the nutrient requirement. The use of
organic fertilizers such as manure, filter cake and vinasse from
sugar factory is also good for soil quality. Water supplement is
important for the growing of sugarcane. In the non-irrigated
areas, the drought-tolerant sugarcane species might be
required (DOA, 2014; OCSB, 2014d).
 Harvesting stage: the farmer should cut sugarcane at age be-
tween 10 and 14 months. The average sugar content should be
over 20 brix. The planning of harvesting period should be
related with the quota that the farmers agree with the sugar
factory. Good planning could help to retain cane weight and
sucrose which will affect sugarcane price. The harvesting should
be green cane cutting as it would be good for the environment
and the farmer can get compensation of around 20 to 60 TH B/
tonne cane from selling green cane. The labor cutting green cane
should cut all stalks which are close to the ground. It could save
cane loss in the field of about 1.9e12.5 tonne/ha which amounts
to around 1163 to 7750 TH B/ha (OCSB, 2015a,b).
4. Conclusions
Different currently-followed harvesting practices for sugarcane
production in Thailand were studied with respect to their GHG
emissions and costs. When considering only the harvesting stage,
there were significant differences between the various harvesting
practices arising particularly due to the choice of manual or me-
chanical harvesting and green or burnt cane. The best practice for
lowest GHG emissions was cutting green cane. Even though GHG is
emitted from cutting machines, it is still lower than from cane
burning. However, GHG emissions for the different harvesting
practices were not significantly different as the contribution of GHG
emissions from the harvesting stage was rather modest. Most of the
GHG emissions were contributed by the cultivation stage which
totally overshadowed the contribution of the harvesting stage. The
highest hiring cost was from mechanical harvesting as some farms
used the service of private cutting machines which have higher
hiring costs compared with the cutting machine of sugar factory.
Moreover, insufficient availability of cutting machines also affected
the use of this harvesting practice in some areas. Therefore, farmers
have not much choice but to find laborers for harvesting cane at
rates which could be negotiated by the laborers. This also reflects in
the practice of burning cane before harvest as it easier to cut than
green cane and is preferred by the laborers even at a lower hiring
cost. Mechanical harvesting is likely to be the most important factor
in future cane production and it could address the labor shortage
problem and avoid burning cane in the field which is a big problem
in the sugarcane industry currently. In conclusion, the good sug-
arcane production practices outlined in Section 3.4 should be
started since land preparation. The test of soil quality is a factor that
farmers should follow up as it would affect the type and amount of
fertilizers application to the field. Also, selection of suitable sugar-
cane species related to geography in each area is important. The
best harvesting practice for environment is green cane cutting by
labor although labor shortage is occurring. Harvesting by cutting
machine is the good choice to improve the situation but the hiring
cost, capacity and sufficient of cutting machine should be also
improved. Further research is recommended to also assess envi-
ronmental impacts other than climate change as well as consider
socio-economic assessment along with yield and cane quality for
the different harvesting systems.
Acknowledgments
This research has been carried out under the projects “Sus-
tainability assessment of sugarcane complex for enhancing
competitiveness of Thai sugarcane industry” (RD&E Fund: F-CO-
2557-037) and “Research Network for LCA and Policy on Food, Fuel
and Climate Change” supported by the National Science and
Technology Development Agency through the research project, and
the Thailand Research Fund under the Royal Golden Jubilee Ph.D.
program (Grant PHD/0101/2557) as well as the Joint Graduate
School of Energy and Environment.
Appendix A. Supplementary data
Supplementary data related to this article can be found at http://
dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2016.07.178.
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