Tarlac Mill District Productivity Background
A very significant increase in productivity is observe during CY 2007-2008 and a drop on productivity on the succeeding crop years. A part of it might be the uproar of prices in farm inputs like fertilizers and fuel. But let me focus on the rainfall pattern that affected the cropping season. During the CY 2007-2008 (please see the the green bar graph), most often the mill opens during the first to second week of November each year. This is also the time when establishing plant cane (new crop) is being done. As we follow the bar graph(green) a favorable growth condition is shown as the growth stages of sugarcane is being superimpose in the figure. Ample moisture during the early establishment and tillering, while a great amount of moisture is being sustained by the rainfall during the grand growth phase and a minimal moisture at the ripening (harvesting stage). With this, the importance of irrigation and drainage is extracted from the simple figure. When to do irrigation and when to draw out excess water from the field.
