if i'm not mistaken, our moa's o ministry of waste management has this worm man logo as one of the partner-organisation on the blog

If you are referring to the Wormman who is a very fat Australian Wayne Fauser, I'd seen in Sabah while attending a talk on composting. I think he had close his business and had team up with some local partner, he is now the Chief Operating Officer of Waynetech Holdings Sdn Bhd. There is also a picture of him here http://biomass-sp.net/gallery5.html Scroll down.

commercially, before feeding the food to the worms, the food is treated with bokashi to speed up the decomposition process. bokashi can be purchased in a small bottle (less than 1 litre)  in some hardware or gardening store

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Added on March 10, 2011, 11:50 pm
There are couple of methods to do this, depending on what you are after.

you use cow manure to feed your worms?

mr.farmer, are you involved in vermiculture? do you have your own farm? can have a look?

Hey guys,

Do we have a method to procure land to start farming? An acre of land is costing RM 20k a piece.

I mean govt wants us to farm but if no land how to farm? I am not a Bumi btw.

Cheers

Kai

ants...i guess you have to rear its own natural predator...try google it...


because, according to the law of waste management, it is illegal to gather or assemble large amount of wastes without permission. that means we have to get a permit to do so. if it is avoidable or unnecessary, of course it will be much easier..so is this act of collecting wastes considered as an illegal one?

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Added on March 15, 2011, 9:32 pmoh, thanks TS!!

Mr. Farmer, no offense taken at all. I am targeting land on southern Kedah. Purchase would be the best deal, bar the price. It is just there has been hearsay on govt giving out land for youths to work on. At the moment, my funds are routed for another biz, hopefully from the biz I can generate enough to buy those plots of land.

I think I will visit your farm first before clearing the bought land by then. Would love to have your contact details. PM me! We can be friends.

Free-handout land to own: Quite impossible

Free-handout land to work: Likely

Handout land to rent: Abounding
I think I've noted this before somewhere. There's this very enterprising group of guys who go about leasing land from government agencies or GLCs. The rental is usually dirt cheap, like RM50/acre a year. Some of the likes are Rubber Research, TNB etc. Try spotting for agencies that are supposed to relocate to a new plot of land, but would only do so after a couple of years (when the funding is finalized). Or, lease the land under TNB cables to plant short term crops. There's this chap in Teluk Intan who leased the entire stretch of land under TNB cables from Simpang Empat all the way to Bagan Nakhoda, and he planted banana for 3 years, followed by sugarcane, and then banana again. He's doing pretty well.

These are my 3 Specimen for my World Eco Products

Papaya A


Papaya B


Papaya C

Sorry Para, do you mean:

A= Thicker leaves
B= More fruit
C= Larger fruit

?

anyone made it to the Organic's Day at SS2 just now? there were lots of organisations supporting permaculture,organic farming , composting, enzyme making and a lot more...

Para:

Agree with Mr. Farmer, it would be better if you have a "control" when doing a comparison study. This control will establish your baseline for any expected improvements.

Comparing papaya with cabbage isn't very plausible, for one reason: they are different organisms. The metabolic pathways, nutrient distribution channels, growth rates etc. are all quite different. For instance, a lot of energy and nutrients are channeled to fruit formation (papaya) instead of leaves (cabbage).

quackpack:
Am sorry to hear about what happened. Is your relative planning to venture into any other crops?
Touching on the issue of diseases, I'll have to say this: it is almost always the fault of ignorance on the part of the farming community. Time and again, it has been proven that all the warnings and prohibitions laid out by MOA and Quarantine are blatantly violated because many in the farming community either think the officers are being mean, greedy for bribes, or possibly plain stupid. But the fact stands that there are very strong reasons for putting these prohibitions. MOA is trying to curb the influx of substandard and disease ridden material from entering the country, but for the sake of being "cheap", a lot of such materials are being illegally brought in. And look at what has happened:

(i) Papaya mosaic virus was introduced into Malaysia through illegal imports of papaya seedlings/planting materials from infested countries; currently devastating the papaya industry
(ii) Swine encephalitis was introduced into Malaysia through illegal import of Taiwanese hogs, which were known carriers of the disease
(iii) Cactus moth and a very virulent strain of soft-rot was introduced into the Pitaya industry, devastating thousands of hectares of Pitaya plantings, due to importation of material from neighbouring countries that did not have proper Sanitary and PhytoSanitary certification (smuggling lar...)
(iv) Collapse of tiger prawn industry in Malaysia due to illegal importation of "white rot" infested tiger prawn larvae
(v) Wide spread infection of Fusarium in banana industry has nearly destroyed the banana plantings in Johore; the cause was linked to unsanitary practices and transport of disease laden soil from "hotspots" to uninfected areas.

I can continue with the list, but I think you get the picture. It is a very sad scene, but if the farming community still insists on going their own direction, and doing things their own way, then I hope they will not turn around and point fingers and pour blame at the very people who first tried to help and protect them.

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Added on March 29, 2011, 8:59 amJust a thought:

With the acute shortage of rubber seeds and seedlings, especially in Sarawak for agroforestry, it would an amazing opportunity for anyone to enter into rubber sapling nursery business right now. Do contract bud-grafting with MRB, and sell the saplings.

Two things are needed for cloned-saplings: (i) Rootstock (grown from seeds) (ii) Clone bud-wood graft (need to get this from MRB)

The opportunity comes immediately for interested parties in the form of collecting and germinating rootstock saplings. With the severe swing in weather patterns, seeds are hard to come by.

Again, just a thought.

Hi, would like to ask to do farming biz do you need to go for courses at Jabatan Pertanian or other courses first before venturing into it ? Or some of you are DIY sell leaner ? Just curious..... 

Thank you MrFarmer ! 

Your words are very inspirational... 

im currently looking for this infor and still collecting and learning bee keeping.
I need one box of Italian bee, 2-4 months left at oil palm land,let the bee hunt and find the source,after 4month like tat,can collect the honey.Can collect up to 5-10 litre of honey for one box,depend.
the problem is i dont have the contact list to buy my honey...im planning June/July to start invest this bee keeping.
I think this is low risk investment.

Currently looking for supplier(Italian bee) and buyer(honey).

Guys,

Please be very careful when you bring in foreign biological materials (be it microbe, animals, or plants); unless you have an enclosed environment or proper safeguard systems where the chances of escape are almost negligeable(eg. a way of containing the queen and any future queens from escaping or "swarming"), please do not bring in anymore foreign species.

In addition, please make sure whoever you get your bees from are qualified and certified (properly), as you wouldn't want to bring in the disease that is killing off the European and American bees into Malaysia.
This may be my own perspective, but I believe that instead of trading the local type of cultivar for a foreign one, a smart farmer either works with, or around the local cultivar, to maximize its potential. My thoughts are that local cultivars (be them plants, animals, of microbes) have been developing in the local environment for a long enough period to become well adapted to the area, including tolerance to weather fluctuations, diseases, predation etc. By working with (eg. selective breeding, proper animal husbandry etc.) and working around (eg. influencing the environment parameters, nutritive content, growth factors etc.), a more desirable result will be obtained in the long run.

Just because a foreign breed has been noted to have higher yields,  faster growth or better temperament elsewhere, that doesn't mean it will suits every locality or country. On the contrary, it might now perform well enough, leading to economic losses; or it might perform too well, and lead to excess and wastage, again causing economic losses. Personally, I'm not sure if the short tem gains are worth the long term losses.

What you might want is to look for the stingless bees of South East Asia. They are usually from the genus Trigona, and are quite common throughout the Indo-Australian neotropics.

This is just a thought, but I believe it should work. The Trigona genus of stingless bees are quite closely related to the Melipona genus from Mexico, which are commonly used in vanilla plantations to pollinate vanilla flowers (as opposed to hand pollination). Intercropping vanilla plants with suitable structure-crops (like coconut) that produces honey, and setting up apiaries amidst those crops, might allow the grower of vanilla to increase production. Just so you know, Trigona genus are also known as "orchid bees", due to their love for sweet-scented orchids.

after 2 rounds of ploughing & initial fertilization, the place is ready for corn planting by the end of the week



those experienced guys, am i doing it right ?

any update on this  thread ?

been waiting and waiting.

I think i will start m fertigation chilli at hulu langat .
there is endless supply of fresh water from stream.

FRESH water i mean.

Either that, or too busy with preparing for the harvest season.

MrFarmer:
Planting calender for which crop? You could check with Jabatan Pertanian.

Which type of sunflower? Generic type, you can get it from supermarkets even. Specific type, you can try searching up ebay Malaysia. There's this company there, Nature Living, or Royal Living, something like that. Occasionally has some very interesting sunflower varieties, like big red sunflowers, or minature sunflowers. Usually sells only seeds.

Stevia cuttings, now that is a little more difficult. I know United Plantations produces some in their Jendarata Estate in Perak, and that Stevian Biotechnology (aka Pure Circle) in Enstek has some kind of contract farming agreement for stevia, but otherwise you'd probably need to get in touch with UPM-associated companies.

long time no c, shifus...i wonder if the demand of corn in malaysia or asian countries would be as high as us? because we have rice here as our staple food. and, i see quite a lot products of lemongrass in the market now, the prices for grass itself is rising too, is the cultivation of the plant wide here?