QUOTE(MrFarmer @ Nov 13 2013, 09:58 PM)
Hello Michael, we miss you. It's been a while since we heard from you. Thank you for your update, you must had been real busy. It must be very interesting propagating all of them. It'll be fantastic if you can hybrid them to be drought / wet feet tolerant and high yield.
The Butter squash is popular here too. When I was planting pumpkins, there were request from the wholesaler.
Hi Mr Farmer,
Haa.... yea, I've been really busy lately... sorry about that.
About the Butternut squash, yes, very very popular. And the prices are quite high too. The Waltham variety in particular has very strong prices. The other types are starting to lose prices, but still fetch about RM10-15 per fruit. I think the main reason why they are so popular is because they are a very versatile variety of squash. I've made things ranging from pumpkin pies, custards, stews, soup, salads, and biscuits using them. And like their namesake, they have a buttery taste to it.
Anyway, moving on to the current topic of...
Mr Farmer:
I see you are using two grafting methods here, the side-graft and wedge-graft. Have you tried collared grafting?
xeroxphan:
I believe Mr Farmer has given you his answer. I would like weigh in also -
(1) It is great that both you and your friend have such passion for agriculture. However, my advice, as is that of Mr Farmer, is that you guys stick around in your respective companies longer, and learn as much as you can from your respective companies first. It is not just the agro-science parts that you need to know, but also all the downstream activities, eg. accounting, post-harvest management, marketing, etc., in addition to on-the-ground operations, man-management and costings etc. If you like, you could try raising a small patch first, say a few hundred square feet, to practice some of the skills needed.
As for doing this part time, better check what is the policy of your company... the plantation company I worked with before specifically mentioned in the contract that execs in the company cannot own agriculture land, at the risk of being fired. Apparently, there will be a conflict of interest.
(2) 3-4 acres is not small. Just use bananas as an example, one acre will have 600 trees (monocropping), and 4 acres will be 2,400 trees. If you planted things like corn, 4 acres will have 16,000 plants easily.
I will agree with Mr Farmer that you should have a thorough enough knowledge of whatever crop you intend to plant (on a large scale), or at least have access to extension officers that are knowledgeable enough in it near your farm. Knowledge is key to efficiency and effectiveness in agriculture.
That saying, there are inherent differences between tree crops and vegetable crops. For one, vegetable crops do require a greater deal more care from pest and diseases, but are very short term investments. Most vegetable crops can be harvested after 150-180 days, and you will be able to plant 2 seasons a year if you are efficient. The downside, however, is that vegetable crops also tend to cost more to cultivate, with a smaller profit margin.
Let's use corn for example: One acre will yield roughly 4,000 ears of corn per season, and for every 7 cobs, you get RM10. So your gross income from 4,000 ears should be RM5,700. But the cost of growing the corn comes up to almost RM3,500 (fertilizer, seeds, pesticides etc.), making your profit margin about RM2,200 only. Spread over 4 months of work, that is equivalent to RM550 per month. Not a whole lot. But demand often outstrips supply for certain crops.
But with tree crops, the lead time is much longer, in most cases 3-8 years. Tree crops, however, do not consume as much fertilizer as short term crops, and herbicides are mostly critical only at the early stages. I'm not that familiar with fruit trees, but using coconuts as example, the 3 years of growing time will cost about RM9,000. Under good agriculture practices, a one hectare coconut farm will yield about 12,000-15,000 fresh tender drinking nuts, and about 3,000-5,000 dried mature nuts a year. At a farmer's market price of RM2.00 per fresh coconut, that is equal to RM24,000 per year. Not bad at all. The only problem is that compared to vegetables, the demand is not as stable.
(3) Unfortunately, I am no longer "doing" agriculture in the traditional sense. Right now I'm more of a seed hunter and full-time ag-scientist.
A final note: If you do want to get a feel of agrobusiness, and there are no restrictions barring you from doing this, I will suggest that you do short term fruit crops, like banana, for a start. But do your research on market demand first, bearing in mind that such crops only provide harvest about 12-18 months after planting. So try to get a good idea of cropping projections from other farms, see what they are all planting, and then plant something different (but still with strong demand). If it is difficult for you to do so, then try hedging your production by planting different percentages of each crop, eg. 50% berangan, 30% nipah, 20% rastali. This way, if the prices of one or two crops dip, at least the one crop can help keep your enterprise afloat.
A story I like to use to describe this fully is about a banana grower I dealt with before, while still in the plantation industry. He had wanted to grow Berangan bananas, but our tissue culture lab had sold-out the entire production for the year already. Instead, our chief clerk suggested that he plant Rastali bananas, which we had quite a high stock (the prices for Rastali banana that production year was low). The grower was quite reluctant at first, but bought 100,000 plants anyway, lest his rented land remained unplanted. The next year he came back, and informed us that as everyone else had planted Berangan, prices for Rastali soared. And because he was one of the few who had planted Rastali, he made 60% more than what he could have if he had planted Berangan.
This post has been edited by Michael J.: Dec 1 2013, 10:13 AM 
Nov 29 2013, 10:29 PM
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