Sugar recovery rates in Louisiana, Florida, and Australia (1901–2018): Sugarcane varietal development and cultural practices

Australia, Florida, and Louisiana are dominant sugar producers. We use piecewise regression to compare the growth in sugar recovery rates. To discuss sugarcane ( Saccharum officinarum L.) varietal development and cultural practices, we consider two scenarios: the entire period 1901 to 2018 and two subperiods using country‐specific breakpoints. The overall annual increase in the sugar recovery rate for all three regions ranged between 0.0180% for Australia and 0.0525% for Florida. In the first subperiod, Florida (0.2380%, 1928–1941) and Australia (0.1233%, 1901–1927) have the greatest annual gains, but in the second subperiod, Louisiana experiences the greatest annual gains (0.0813%, 1969–2018), followed by Florida (0.0531%, 1942–2018) and Australia (−0.0075%, 1928–2018). Louisiana's gains from 1969 to 2018 coincide with the adoption and use of the sugarcane cultivars CP 65‐357, CP 70‐321, LCP 85‐384, HoCP 96‐540, and L 01‐299.