I learnt of the "Tomato Gold" from a colleague about 2 years ago.
And ever since I have been working on hitting the jackpot.

You can check my other write ups on Nairaland.
We all know tomato is the current Nigerian Gold.

" Why have you not hit the so called Jackpot??
People that knows me keep wondering.

Even I wonder myself.

" The same thing that prevents other tomato farmers from reaching Gold Spot since!!!!!!

' All you keep saying is agriculture is good, its the way, its that and we are yet to see the result'

Hmnnnnnnn.

Each time you think you are so near and its just some seconds then boooom and something will surely sprut up to distrupt you from making the billions.

You can call this " My lamentations"

And then it dawn on me that

" To succeed in every business venture, one needs to learn the rope"

Yes. You need to get some basic understanding. If possible proceed to the secondary class.

....I remembered years ago when my cousin once told me she wants to register and learn how to sell children wears...


What??
That's ridiculous.
I said. In my ignorance.

"Is it not just to go to market??
buy the wears??
check your cost price??
fix your selling price??

And sells?.

" And I also used to wonder why an intended spare part seller will stay with "Oga" to learn for good 5 years"

Notice the word "Used"

Now I know better.

I went into Agric with the same mentality.
Having the believe that "You will surely succeed in any business if you have the finance"

But I learnt Funds is not the utmost.
" Knowledge is Power"

'

" Knowledge is power"
.....is what I learnt expensively

I deft into agribusiness in my ignorance.
"My thought after reading the so much online publications and miscalculations was .....

Do everything and you get the result.

But there are so much hidden facts they did not write about.

eg. No one can tell you the quantity of rain that will fall in the month of June.

That fact alone could help you decide to plant whether a rain loving crop or a draught tolerant crop.

' You wan become God?
Your thought.....

Not at all.
That's to let you know the big risk you are getting involved in.

" Someone has once accused me of always writing and talking about challenges in the farm"

My replied was

" You don't go to war unprepared"
" You succeed when you are fully prepared"

One of my trainers from COLEACP will always say:

Prepare!
Prepare!!
Prepare!!!

Ever since I heard about the Tomato Gold.
I have been doing everything humanly possible to get to the core.
To become a tomato billionaire.

From some of my earlier post, I did some naughty calculations there that makes people fell in love with the tomato theory.

' So what are the challenges'?

One is forced to ask.

" Tomatoes is a very delicate crop"

But in most online write ups, blogs etc, its usually written as the easiest crop to grow.

hmnnnnn.

Let me divert a little.....

Google "Tomato growing" or whatever about tomatoes.

Loads and loads of information will come up.

Then Google " Tomato growing in Nigeria".
You will be amazed.

Amazed because there is little or no research about growing all this crops in our country.

So most of what we follow online might not work for our.....
Climate
Soil
Temperature
etc.

Following!

Back to my topic
Growing Tomatoes Successful in Nigeria.
Let's start from the ...
1. Seed Selection
I receive calls daily from people that want me to recommend the best seed for planting.

" But suprisingly I don't do that"

Why

Currently there are no seed production company/laboratory or whatever in Nigeria.

All our seeds are imported.
From Thailand, Kenya, France, etc

These seeds are produced to suits the environment at where they are being researched.

" Imagining you importing a Temperate zone seed variety to grow in Nigeria of mostly Tropical zone"?

And you expect a bloody farmer like me to tell you this is the best.

Sorry.

No. I pass

It took me years in the farm to know that seed that thrive well in environment A might not germinate in environment B.

So what do you advise?

If you ask me.....

I always say " try out at least 3 varieties of seed.
Put them under the same maintenance conditions and see how they thrive.

And then you can be the best judge for your farm.

We have several seed sellers available.
You can easily get in touch with them for your seed.

And be on your way to growing tomatoes succesively

And not forgetting that...
The most expensive is not the best and the cheapest is not the worst when dealing with seed selection.

There are different ways of identifying seeds.
1. The open breed
2. The hybrid
3. GMO

1. The open breed is what I generally referred to as "tiwa n tiwa" meaning Our own.

These seeds can be re extracted from the fruits and use again in the next season.

They have low tolerance to pest and disease.

2. The hybrid are produced under controlled conditions.

Its involves cross pollinating two good crops to get a better result.

If these are extracted, they will not give you the good stock of the first generation f1 family again.

They have high resistance and tolerance level to some pest and diseases.

They are also of high yield.

3. GMO. its Genetically Modified species.
Never taken much interest in this other than I know its been rejected in most countries because it has so much adverse effects.

And being the farmer that I am, still perfectly working with the no 1 and 2.

NOTE:

Resistance to a certain pest or diseases did not mean that the crop will not and can not be attack by such pest.

It only means it will survive better compared to other open breed.

This would be a great eye opener. Well done!

Pest and Diseases.

Writing on pest and diseases means I have jumped several other steps that you will need to produce your tomatoes succesfuly.

I will surely get back to them. I am writing as
the spirit leads.

e gets as e be.

If you are like me that read a lot you would have read several ways of preventing pest and diseases of various vegetables especially Tomatoes.

One other thing they don't tell you is that the statement:

" prevention is better than cure"

rings very true for tomatoes.

I always tell my trainees, once your tomato farm is infected, just forget it.

There is no cure or remedy.

If you like finish all the fungicide, the insecticide and whatever they recommend.

Its all business's strategy.
Man must chop.

Your best bet is preventive method.
Do all the necessary from the beginning

Pest and diseases comes in different forms.
And several pest also exist.
They also vary from region to region.

Tuta Absoluta has been in existence for some time.

It has attacked in Uganda, Kenya and even Brazil.

It has been in Nigeria since last year just that the effects was well pronounced this year.

It also affects pepper and potatoes but major crop is tomatoes.

By middle of last year.
July precisely.
I sourced for some tomato seeds.
Hybrid off course

And it was said to be tolerance to nematodes and some other name I don't know.

Before then, nematodes has been the main tomato challenges.
Nematodes form like nodules at the root of the plant.

The crop will automatically dried up.
And like earlier said it has no cure.

So my believe is that growing a nematodes resistance variety will solve my issues.

The tomato did so well from nursery until it starts fruiting.

And suddenly instead of the fruits getting ripe, the plants was drying up.

It was a sad occurrence.
Every crop went to waste.

It was during one of our coaching sections with IFDC 2SCALE projects that I first heard of Tomato Ebola.

From leaf blight to Downey mildew to nematodes to septora blight and now the Ebola.

What's the prevention method?
I asked the coach.

He make some calls and they recommend one fungicide. Can't actually remember the name.

And then he said "Best bet is to build a small net house.

" Net house* . The farmers chorused

Yes. The net house will shield the tomato from the pest which carry the infections.

he further explained.....

How many net house did we want to build?

" A farmers believe is to have several acres of farm land"

"That's a complete no no. !!! some said
" It can't work. .....Another voice out
" It will be too expensive.....

And we opt to using some fungicide.

Did we succeed

And we put head together for another tomato planting season.

The target is to meet the peak period market which should be between March ending to August/ September.

We have tomato farmers group and we do meet regularly to discuss matters arising.

We agreed at the meeting to use a specific hybrid varieties.

Every members is to start their nursery by the 15th of December.

So that harvesting can tally and we can go to market together considering we are at some distance to the farm.

Meanwhile before then. I have been oppourtuned to attend a vegetable farm where the variety was grown in a screen house.

Greenhouse/ Screenhouse/ nethouse are all referring to the same thing.

Though they have some slight variations.
To be discuss at some other point.

We bought the seed, plough the land, do the necessary things and work begins in harness.

Ploughing the land was a big challenge.
There was no rain and the tractor operators said the soil is too hard.

We have to source for tractor from another town. And we also pay double of what it use to be.

Water source was a borehole and fuel was another big deal.
We were buying fuel at N120 per litre.
We use 150 litre per week.
The generator runs for 18hrs per day.

And we were on the farm all through the festive period.

It was a tough one.
Same with other farmers too.

Most struggle to buy water tanks.
They use their pick ups to supply water to the farm.

Morning and night.
Everyday

The tomatoes started well. Every one was happy.
Our target market was the peak period starting from April.
It has been known that tomatoes price skyrocket during that period.
And then suddenly. The unexpected begins to happen. The crops were infected. We couldn't point out to what the exactly it is.
To cut the long story short.
" We couldn't harvest anything from the tomato farm of about 4 acres.
4 acres. Yes.
not even a small basket at a time.
I was devastated.
Money gone down the drain. All efforts
And same with all other farmers in our group. None harvest any tomatoes. All our efforts gone.

It was when I chatted with one of my contacts in the North who is also a tomato farmer that the Ebola topic came up again.

Hmnnnnn. What can we do?

He mentioned there are some foreigners close by that have several greenhouse tomato farms.
And they are making good money.

And then I remembered my other trainings, the several suggestion to build a greenhouse.

Greenhouse in Nigeria are very expensive.
Dizengolf, who is the only greenhouse importer is selling a 24m by 8 m size for N1,500,000.

Hmnnnn

Where do I get such?
I have incurred several debts from the farm.
No one do assist farmers financially.

At a big cross road.

Yet I need to get to the root of growing tomato successfully.

Meanwhile I have read so much of how Kenyans are constructing their own greenhouse using other materials.

What could be the other materials.
How can we go about it?

And with my team and the trainees that were around, we did construct a 4m by 5m green house sourcing all the materials locally.

We call it our trial greenhouse.

I wrote somewhere about greenhouse/net house/ screen house.

Greenhouse is the popular name.
but most green house are fully controlled eg
Temperature
Water
etc.

Same with nethouse and screen house except we don't use temperature control in the 2.

We construct a smaller one to test whether the tomatoes will do well in it.

Did it do well?

Well done ! My regards to your team.

Following....

jethro2:
And with my team and the trainees that were around, we did construct a 4m by 5m green house sourcing all the materials locally.

We call it our trial greenhouse.

I wrote somewhere about greenhouse/net house/ screen house.

Greenhouse is the popular name.
but most green house are fully controlled eg
Temperature
Water
etc.

Same with nethouse and screen house except we don't use temperature control in the 2.

We construct a smaller one to test whether the tomatoes will do well in it.

Did it do well?

Did it do well?

I'm really praying to hear 'it did well'

Nigeria needs more problem solvers like yourself! I hope this worked, but even if it did not your process of finding ever diverse methods to solve the problems at hand within your affordability, and with the resources you have available is commendable. I am taking note and actively following!

From all indication, screen house farming has proved to be the most profitable but the problem lies on the capital to build it. Ride my teacher.. .

Following.......

Wow! Following with rapt attention

Isn't this interesting?...donno how well the seeds will do in Nigeria but I'm thinking of giving it a short. Ukrainean supplier

About this nethouse, I don't think it will be much of a solution...there are several spores of disease causing fungus in the air that can pass though the net...maybe you should just cover the whole damn thing with a transparent nylon except the topmost which you can cover with a white trampoline


Whichever way, it's still a learning curve....I'm curiously waiting for the outcome, and I'm hoping it works!

Well done Ma.

Willie2015:
Well done ! My regards to your team.

Thank you sir

Thank you sirs and mas.

I really appreciate you.

NobleJones:
Well done Ma.

Juliana7:
Wow! Following with rapt attention

Pavore9:
Following.......

ell77:
Nigeria needs more problem solvers like yourself! I hope this worked, but even if it did not your process of finding ever diverse methods to solve the problems at hand within your affordability, and with the resources you have available is commendable. I am taking note and actively following!

Mercie123:

Did it do well?
I'm really praying to hear 'it did well'

lanre2009:
Following....

And my team get back to work. We nursed the tomatoes by the second week of April. And we transplanted on the 29th of April 2016.
And the prayer session starts.
Why become prayer warrior?.
The Nylon we use was not the recommended transparent UV treated.
We were not sure it will work.
So we keep counting months.
We were doing hand wetting using watering can. Water must not touch the leaves.
We scout for insects and pest that may find their way in.
Once in a while we do pick some Tuta Absoluta. Yes. Tuta Absoluta
Mind you the screen house is not an 100% insurance against pest.
Why not
Your net might have a tear!!!! Your polyethylene cover might have some leak!!! Insects might come in through your cloth. Your shoe can bring in some virus.
hmnnnnn.
Yes. One still need to be extremely careful

The tomatoes was growing,
As we waters.

We feed it with manure tea every other weak.
We spray Neem insecticide every week.

We stake when they were growing tall.
We prune as at when neccesary

preparing the nursery

The tomato seedlings at maturity. About to transplant

Newly transplanted

this is really good jethro keep it up.

ishaqteejay:
this is really good jethro keep it up.

please is the polyethylene in the net house working.do you think there will be penetration of sun light?