Overview

Sugar beets are a root crop grown predominantly in cooler climates. Areas of production are concentrated in northern states and the mountain west, with the largest acreage in Minnesota, Michigan, North Dakota and Idaho. The summary chart for sugar beets indicates steady improvement for land use, energy use and greenhouse gas emissions indicators, as well as improvement over the study period for irrigation (Figure 1.10.1). Table 1.10.1 presents a summary of all indicators for sugar beets for reference years. Unfortunately, there is a lack of key, up-to-date data for sugar beets. For example, crop protection and fertilizer usage were last surveyed in 2000. The late 2000s were an important time period as a new variety of genetically engineered sugar beet was introduced and adopted almost universally by U.S. sugar beet growers in 2009-2010 (USDA APHIS, 2020; USDA Economic Research Service, 2021). This variety requires fewer crop chemical inputs; however, no surveys on chemical use have been conducted after this transition period, so we are unable to fully quantify environmental impacts related to sugar beet production. For this edition of the National Indicators Report, sugar beet yield units are expressed in tons of sugar rather than raw tons. The sucrose percent data reported by USDA was used to calculate this adjustment. Figure 1.10.1. Summary chart of indicators for sugar beets during 1980-2020 Data are presented in index form, where all indicators have been scaled by indicators averages for the period 1998-2002. A 0.1 point change is equal to a 10 percent difference. Index values allow for comparison of change across indicators with different units of measure. A smaller area represents improvement over time. Additional illustrations of sugar beet sustainability on a per acre basis and for total resource use are available in Appendix B, accessible from the Download Report link. 

Land Use

Acres planted to sugar beets increased from 1980 to 2000 before declining, and in 2020 is similar to that of the mid-1980s (Figure 1.10.2). The production of sugar beets has steadily increased over time, with some interannual variations (Figure 1.10.3). The land use efficiency indicator reflects crop yield increases, with significant improvements in the period from 2000 to 2010 (Figure 1.10.4). In recent years, the land use efficiency has shown a gradual improvement.

Energy Use Efficiency

Energy use efficiency for sugar beet production has improved throughout the study period on both a per unit yield (Figure 1.10.5) and per acre basis (Figure B.37). This is driven by improvements in the energy efficiency of the manufacture of fertilizer and crop chemical inputs. Unfortunately, only one year of fertilizer and crop protectant data are available from USDA, therefore, application rates were assumed to be uniform throughout the study.

Greenhouse Gas Emissions

Trends for GHG emissions for sugar beets follow the trends for energy use (Figure 1.10.6). The major factors for the GHG emissions indicator are nitrous oxide emissions from soil and emissions from the manufacture of fertilizers and and crop protectants (Figure B.40). Table 1.10.2 lists the top four contributors for energy use and GHG emissions for sugar beets during 2010 to 2020.

Irrigation Water Use Efficiency

Irrigation water use efficiency for sugar beets improved during the 1980s (Figure 1.10.7). Lower irrigation water use efficiency and significant interannual variations were observed in the 1990s and 2000s, likely driven by weather. A small rate of improvement was observed in the 2010s. The last available Irrigation and Water Management Survey for sugar beets in 2008 indicated that approximately 38% of harvested acreage was irrigated.

Soil Erosion

Soil erosion for sugar beet systems increased slightly from 1980 to 2000 and has since held largely steady at approximately 9 tons of soil loss per acre annually (Figure 1.10.8). Download 
Sugar Beets Data