The sunflower stalks were pretreated by steam explosion (at 1.05 kg/cm(2) for 0.5-1.5 h) and sodium hydroxide (0.25-1.5% w/v NaOH at 1.05 kg/cm(2) for 0.5-1.5 h) using solid : liquid ratio of 0.05 g/ml and subsequently saccharified enzymatically. Steam explosion at 1.05 kg/cm(2) pressure for 1.5 h was found to be the optimum pretreatment. Maximum enzymatic saccharification of 57.8% was observed by treating 5% (w/v) pretreated sunflower stalks with T reesei Rut-C 30 cellulase (25 FPU/g) at 50degreesC, pH 5.0 for 72 h.