Energy Use and Econometric Evaluation of Sweet Sorghum in China

Energy productivity and consume sensitivity of sweet sorghum were investigated in comparison with maize, sunflower, and soybean at Wuyuan and Moqi County, Inner Mongolia Province, China. We got the data from 83 farmers who did grow sweet sorghum at Wuyuan and Moqi County by face-to-face survey. The sweet sorghum showed an expressively higher total energy-consume than sunflower at Wuyuan and soybean at Moqi, but less total energy-consume than maize at Moqi. Sweet sorghum had an expressively higher energy-production and net-energy than soybean, maize and sunflower. Among all the consumes, nitrogen fertilizer expended the highest portion of the total energy for almost the all crops except the diesel consume of sweet sorghum at Moqi which was a little higher than nitrogen fertilizer fraction. Compared with the conference crops, sweet sorghum showed higher diesel energy percentage at both sites (p < %) for a higher machinery level during harvesting season. The renewable energy was expending much lower than non-renewable. Same increase among all the consumes diesel will bring much more production based on Cobb-Douglas manufacture model. The sweet sorghum and conference crops displayed a growing return to scale. These means that production could be improved substantially by a modification of the nitrogen fertilizer amounts and information support systems.