Hello Friends,
We are planning to purchase land and start farm operations hopefully this summer. I will have several questions that I would like to get your advice on.The areas that we are looking to set up the farm is North coastal Andhra districts (Srikakulam, Vizianagaram, Visakhapatnam, West Godavari).
We would like to do multi cropping, integrated farming. I am learning about Subhash Palekar’s natural farming methods and that is most likely the way we would follow.
I would like to know about crops suitable for this region and appropriate soil types
[ol]
*Very short term (3 - 6 months) : Water melon etc
*Short term (1 year) : Banana etc
Medium term (3 - 5 years) : Mango etc
*Long term (7 - 10 years) : Melia Dubia etc[/ol]
Additonal requirements
[ol]
*Should have good growth and pest resistant capabilities
*Should not require lot of inputs and maintenance
*Plants should have good symbiotic relationship (mutually helpful)
*Crops should have good commercial value
*Produce should have good shelf life
*Should have potential for value addition[/ol]
Land prices are way up and at values that make sense only for real estate purposes and not farming. We are looking for flat lands at farming reasonable values in this region, appreciate any pointers in this regard.
Thanks,
Raj