Sweet Sorghum (Sorghum bicolor (L.) Moench)-A New Generation Water Use Efficient Bioenergy Crop

Biofuels have been widely recognized as a best alternative to insulate emerging economies against fastly depleting fossil fuels coupled with highly volatile prices. Sweet sorghum is a multipurpose bioethanol feedstock with greater adaptability with triple benefits (food, fodder and fuel) and cannot be part of much debated food vs. fuel issue. This article gives a brief overview of research results on water use and water use efficiency of sweet sorghum, a new generation bioenergy crop. This feedstock performs superior at many locations in terms of resource use efficiency vis a vis sugarcane, corn and tropical sugar beet and scores fairly well for adaptation to dry land conditions due to its inherent characteristics.