hi murali,
i can help you in giving you saplings of areca. we actually grow them and i am plannnig for some 1k saplings in next summer. if you are sure you need it then i can get you best quality areca plants but we only grow that. we are not doing any business of selling the saplings. if you want i can arrange it for you.
regards,
raitha
Hi Raitha,
Thats very nice of you. I will mail you separately. I came to know that some where near srirangapatana, there is a nursery, solely selling Areca nut saplings.
Any idea what is the cost per plant and which variety yours is ?. I have seen one called Managla, bearing nuts where the tree was only 3 ft tall !!
Regards
Murali
Dear Raitha,
I appreciate your passion, love & affection to this wonderful sector,. Agriculture is the oldest of oldest and first profession known to the mankind.
Yesterday, today and tomorrow agriculture is the biggest industry in the world.
If u go back to 2004, you will came to know that agriculture is a loss making sector for the entrepreneur. Wheter may be it is cereals, pulses, foodgrains, flowers, fruits or vegetables all are making net loss.
So, nobody is looking towards to this facinating sector. Since 2005 slowly things are changing and farming community is making some profits. Now every body is talking about agriculture.
Today there are some crops where u can make a assured net profit of Rs.50k acre/annum. So. all guys from all sectors i.e., software, hardware, construction, real estate etc., etc., are looking into this sector.
Income and profits are the only factors which will decide the destiny and future of any sector.
If there is no profit no takers. This is true.
Regards
Raghu Ram
Mr.Raghuram,
Thank you for having confessed underlying fact about agriculture
Regards, Mr.Ramu
Hi Raitha / Murali & others
I was Head of Strategy for a Nasscom top 10 IT company and have left recently to start my own ventures. One of the ventures is to start a farm on the outskirts of pune. I have brought 6.5 acres of water touch land. Along with farming I intend to use this land for an eco spritual resort. I have done a lot of research and have also built a eco system for manifesting these plans. I am a bit delayed because of some minor issues related to road access which should bet sorted soon.
It is not a coincidence that so many people are getting interested in farming. In general there has been a huge shift in the collective human consciousness which wants to make life more meaningful/ joyful by being close to nature, community and expressing themselves more originally and creatively. All of these means that you will no longer be lured by the false security / prestige of the corporate world. I have a much more deeper explanation for this shift/ transformation in human consciousness since I am very deeply involved in spirituality but would not be able to explain it here.
It is an established fact that the next boom will be agriculture. Even now there are people who are minting money in this field. Apart from an acute food shortage which will make agriculture lucrative, I also see a trend where people would like to eat healthy and pay significantly more for non GM food grown organically. Also see a huge potential for agro tourism and related community building activities which promote sustainable living. I could go on but hopefully we will interact more later
Rgds
randhir.sinha@gmail.com
9850960162
just an after thought :-
Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive, and go do it. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.
Hi All,
Some inputs based on my experience and thinking. I am into part time farming and part time software, left my full time job in Bangalore an year ago.
I have 9.25 acres of land and do natural farming on that. As I see it, generating a decent income from farming is difficult and will take time and especially for people who were earlier drawing lot of money as salary. With farming you get good health and peace of mind and you can enjoy your life and for this it is better that you have to get involved in the farming and do at least some part of the physical work.
Price of agriculture products is not in our control. Farmers put lot of hardwork and finally don’t get sufficient income for their products. Lots of profit will be taken by middleman and government policies decide the price of agriculture products so farmers don’t have any options. So farmers come to a point that they can not depend on society or government to take care of them and they should not be much dependent on them, so they should have food completely from farm, so that dependency is less.
But it may also happen that agriculture becomes focus point and agriculture products good decent money, but it may be a distant dream, so better to get prepared for that. But nothing controls the real joy in farmings and its thrilling life.
Here are some blogs including mine.
farming-experiments.blogspot.com/
greenlocal.org/
csm-fanaa.blogspot.com/
dobighazameen.wordpress.com/
vanashree.in/
Regards,
Nandan
p_k_nandanan@yahoo.com
+91-80-89639261
Nandan
Thanks for your inputs, plan to read "One straw revolution "
Although I dont have any prior experience in farming, I have across news and people who have made money esp by using multi cropping/ Hi- Tech/ Integrated farming.
One such news clipping is as follows (The farmer makes 22 lakhs in 2.1 acres of land)
hindu.com/2010/04/20/stories … 660300.htm
Rgds
Randhir
Another good book to read is Five acres and Independence
books.google.co.in/books/about/F … edir_esc=y
This classic of the back-to-the-land movement is packed with solid, timeless information. Written by a renowned horticulturist, it has taught generations how to make their land self-sufficient, with explanations of organic farming techniques and reliable advice on other topics, including irrigation, livestock, crops, greenhouses, fertilizers, much more.
Hi,
very good thinking becoming educated farmer is the best job on earth…Good luck
Hi Randhir,
Thanks for sharing information of Sadananda (planning to visit him sometime) and ‘Five acres and Independence’. We may lack the skills and smartness of Sadananda but definitely it should be possible to acquire it over years.
Let us all explore …
Regards,
Nandan
We are talking about the same person?
farmnest.com/forum/natural-farmi … s-of-land/
Cheers.
Here is another blog of a techie turned farmer
and here is a book Cubicle Farm Fantasy: An Indian It Worker’s Dream about Escaping the Rat Race
Hi,
What Mr.P.K.Nandanan said is appreciated. This discussion will grow never ending. All software engineers who strongly believe in agriculture income may better resign present job in lieu of farming jobs.Show your expertise atleast for 3 contiguous years in agribusiness activities and post your experience in the same farmnestcom.Then this topic will really be an interesting subject of deliberation and discussion
Ram
This is our own forum member saverafarms!
Hello Mr. Raita,
I am new to this forum and I have read about your enthusiasm in working in agriculture. Congrats and I welcome you for this initiative.
Since You are new to agriculture, I need to say some points about agroeconomy and how it works because whatever we do ,the bottomline is profit and rate of return from investment.
Always keep in mind that agriculture is cyclical in nature . sometimes it will be in peak and sometimes in bottom .
Farmers cannot name the price for their produce prices because the life of their product is less which need to sold within days
No matter whatever happens to agriculture and farmer, government won’t do anything because farmer’s produce is in the ‘need’ list of the people especially poor and not in ‘want’ list
Unlike preeconomic liberalization, imports and exports are very easy nowadays so governments can easily change the supply level within a week if it want to
The world’s most water dependant business is agriculture. The rainfall and climate affects agriculture in a great level
Intensive labor requirement. There are three stages of plant life:upto sowing,from sowing to harvesting and from harvesting to despatch. Eventhough there are lot of technologies for first two levels, harvesting is still labor sensitive one except some plants like corn, sugarcane and paddy where the produce are strong unlike vegetables
25% of expense goes for preparation of soil, purchase o f seed ,etc., 30% by fertilizers. We need to take care of these two expenses as they have the potential to sunk the farmer
Monocropping and overproduce leads to high swinging in farmers income either higher profit or higher losses
But nowadays we are some lights at the end of tunnel
Since lot of farms are converted into plots,the left out ones are facing the postive waves like increase in price for the produce (a medium range cow fetches a price of 30,000 rs nowadays)
The fertilzers are being replaced by natural farming in a very very slow manner
which reduces our expense
Drip irrigation is taking care of water and labor shortage but beware it is expensive and need to maintained against rodents
Integrated farming and taking farming as part time helps farmers overcome cyclical nature of agriculture because of multiway incomes
8) Agroforestry (growing trees in lands) also gives farmer a sustainable and near zero maintanence income nowadays
Hope u find these details useful.
Regards,
visit me at runafarm.blogspot.com
Hi All,
After going thru the discussions it looks like every one is against venturing into agriculture. Pointed out are Labor problems, at the mercy of nature, marketing, prices fixed by the market and a few other points.
If every thing of the above is true, then according to the law of economics, agricultural lands must be available cheap, I mean very very cheap. But the case is quite opposite. The rates quoted are shocking. . Looks like any decent land with road, near by village, water, power etc is in upwards of a minimum 2 lakhs / acre. and going as high as some 90 Laks to even a crore and above. No I am not hinting at lands that can be converted to a residential layout or a factory. I mean plain Agri lands. In karnataka at most of the places , ie near by talukas, the rates are 5 L/ Acre. An FD will fetch 9 to 10 %, ie more than the agricultural produce .
Why then are agricultural lands becoming prohibitively expensive
Regards
Murali
Murali & others,
The land prices are up because land is not factory made. There is only a limited supply of land. Despite the factors that you mention (weather/labour/input costs etc etc) the fact is that there is only a limited supply of land. If you need more land for agriculture then the government has to de-allocate some of the forest land which is unlikely to happen.There is a booming speculative trade happening in real estate including agricultural lands. Some of the top companies in the world and in India are busy buying farm lands as they see massive potential. Also, a lot of city folks who get fed up of the daily routine are willing to pay premiums to buy patches of agricultural land to build second homes. Yes they call that second home where they live a mere 15 days in a year.
Ours is a growing economy. Our population is going through the roof. Being the biggest population the world, It will not be an easy task to feed a population in excess of a billion. we will consume more of vegetables, fruits, meats etc in the coming years but the question is does our production/supply match our demand?. There will be a super duper demand for agricultural produce over the next two decades. In fact, there could likely be a shortage of agricultural produce over the next few years as a lot of farmers are moving away from traditional farming to relocate to cities. Add to this vagaries of weather, policy etc we are headed for a whole lot of rut.
Educated farmers, enthusiasts like you and me can change things around a bit. Being specifically educated in agriculture brings in a lot of advantages. Its just any other job. If you have no know-how then you will loose money in the initial years until you have figured out the tricks of the trade. Why not then get some education in agriculture. I know it seems far fetched when I ask you to get education in farming. You probably think you have to go back to college. Fact is, in today’s well networked world, nothing is impossible. There are so many online courses that can enhance your knowledge. These courses, although online and lacking in practicals can at least give you text book knowledge which could help you in the long run. I recently downloaded a Banana growers manual from an Australian university and was quite happy reading a concise manual that laid down basics of banana growing. Now you see if i were a new farmer growing bananas, the manual could be of great help. By being educated in agriculture, you are in a better position to assimilate knowledge and use it for your benefit in terms of optimum usage of your land, cropping, pest management, improving output per acreage, improved harvesting methods, marketing your produce etc etc.
Whoever says that you cannot make money in agriculture probably does not have a good understanding of the potential of agriculture. Ask yourself why should agriculture be treated as agriculture ? Why not treat it as an enterprise? like any other business? You see here lies the problem. Most of the farmers who don’t make enough do not have the right approach to commercial farming. Most of us treat agriculture as just a way of growing something. If we treat agriculture like any other business, we could have the best of both the worlds i.e money and peace of mind or whatever other reason you want to do agriculture.
you probably have read the story of the farmer who earns about 22 lakhs from 2 acres of land. If he can do it why not us? Even if you end up with 10 lakhs from 2 acres its an awesome deal.
I personally know a few guys who are minting tonnes of money in agriculture. One of the biggest problems faced by the farmer is disposing off his produce at reasonable prices. So doesn’t it make sense to grow things that have longer shelf life or enhance the value of their produce?? For example, Coconut farmers can extract coconut oil which pays better than just selling their coconuts in the market. Banana growers can make banana chips and sell as a branded product. There are so many ways of doing things. Of course, some of these things need additional capital but then again it depends on what you want to do.
Naturally/organically farmed produce has so much potential. So thats an area one can explore. My personal opinion is … It is we who set our own limitations. Agriculture offers unlimited potential for monetary benefits (and spiritual benefits)
Lastly, dont get into agriculture only for MONEY. I know money is extremely essential for survival. Do it only if you are passionate about it and money will follow eventually. I know it sounds contradicting to my statements above where I opined that agriculture has to be treated like a business. Of course it has to be but the point is, you will have to be passionate about your BUSINESS OF AGRICULTURE. No passion = No Success
Plus 1,
No Pain = No Gain,
Yes I totally agree with you. Now even though I can manage to handle only around 5 Acres, I am seriously thinking of keeping additional land bank. Let it lie around.
I have figured it out that it is a cycle. All the farmers now have very marginal land holdings due to inheritance and are selling it off. People like us from cities are picking it up. Yes the mistake is that we are paying a premium. Thus spoiling the economy of the village. In karnataka, that too south of karnataka, a land holding of 10 Acres in one name, one piece is a rarity. Such consolidations are always done by city guys. Picking up what is coming up for sale.
Traditionally the prices of the land used to be what the neighbor fixes. If the seller approaches the neighbor, the price is fixed by the neighbor based on sellers urgency, if the neighbor approaches to buy, then the price fixed by the seller. Too much of disparity. Well that was it used to be. And the biggest hindrance is every buyer wants an approach road to the land.
Regards
Murali
Hi Agri-executive
Your point is to think agriculture in commercial terms.Of course what you said is right.Her is an example. One tonne of sugarcane is sold by the ryot to factory @ Rs 2250. suppose if he crush the cane himself , he will get around 100 kgs of sugar,50 litres of molasses , some 200 kgs of baggasse and some 50 kgs of ash.
100 kgs of sugar =Rs 3200
50 liter molasses if converted to alcohol will fetch Rs.1500
200 kgs baggasse if converted to paper will give Rs. 2000
50 kgs ash if made organic manure will bring Rs. 500
So one tonne of sugarcane if converted to various end products , will yield an income of Rs.7200. Where as farmer get only Rs 2250/ ton.The difference is Rs.4950. Here the question is whether a farmer can do all these to realize an entire sum of Rs.7200?.so here lies the problem. Further if a banana grower make all the bunches of banana into chips, definitely he can get more than 25 lac rupees per acre per year instead of selling raw banana for just 1 lac rupees per acre.Seeing agriculture in commercial terms will not always hold good.I looks like seeing a small object thro’ a magnifying lens.
when we got independence, our population was around 30 crores, also our food production was around 25 million tonnes. Now our population is around 120 crores, also our food production is around 120 million tonnes.But indian geographical area is always the same . it is technology which do a wonder.Necessity is the mother of invention.There is no soil in Israel but they are doing wonder in agriculture.how?
For anything and everything, there is a real value.An escalated price for land is due to some temporary causes.It can be seen thro recent happenings in the software industries.What was the position of software industries some 5 years ago and what is it now?
Agriculture has got some inherent problems since its beginning.6 months back, DAP fertilizers were sold at around Rs.500 now it is almost double the price.Where as 6 months back tomoto price was around Rs.30/ks. now it is Rs.1/kg. what will you do. Can you keep it till better price comes? you cant because it is a perishable commodities.
Anyhow try your level best.Because life is nothing but trial and error.Agriculture can but reasonably do.
Regards,
RAM