Sugar raisers in Australia are expecting a sweet and $2.1-billion bumper harvest as growers in Tableland starts crushing cane on Monday.

Steve Greenwood, chief executive officer of industry body Canegrowers, disclosed that the industry expects to crush over 31 million tonnes of cane in 2012. He said the industry has never been this optimistic in a decade.

The expected five-month harvest is 3 million to 4 million tonnes more than the 2011 and 2010 harvests that were marked by the early start of the wet season and heavy rains and cyclone Yasi which battered Queensland.

He attributed the positive outlook to the fast rebound of the industry from 2011's natural disasters and high demand for Australian sugar from Asia.

Drew Watson, chairman of Canegrowers, said that even if prices are expected to go down a bit, with the Australian dollar slightly lowers, Aussie farmers would still come out of this season's harvest well.

Other areas expected to start harvesting sugarcane this week are Tully and Innisfail, while Mulgrave will start next week.

Besides the bumper harvest, another reason behind the optimism in the country's sugar industry is the increase to more than 70 per cent from 30 per cent the foreign ownership of Australian sugar-mill assets the past 18 months