I have been hearing lots of people, talking about different types of Agricultural produce they can plant or would want to plant, But what i have not seen on these forum is for someone to really come out and tell us, all the stress, difficulties, ups and down he/she went through before setting up there plantation.

I want to start by saying i have managed to secure mine self 13 plots of land. Each plot is a 100 by 100 feet. i want to start up an oil palm plantation. I have been able to buy 1755 oil palm Nursery from NIFOR. My story goes like these.......

Each oil palm nursery cost 150 Naira
Loading of each oil palm Nursery inside the vehicle is 20 Naira each
I paid 50,000 to convey the goods from IMO state to Ibusa Delta state.


On getting to the farm, the vehicle could not get to ibusa on time, the vehicle got to ibusa around 9.30pm. So the vehicle had to park in the house for the night. The next morning the journey to the farm began around 6.30Am, on getting to the entrance of the farm, the vehicle could not go in, because of poor road network. The vehicle managed to drive in but as the vehicle drove in, some sticks punctured one tire. So we had to off load the hold oil palm nursery on the ground. So we hard to go hire a pick up van. The van owner charged us 6,000 to convey the nursery to a location closer to mine own farm because there are other people farm in front of mine farm. now after that, i had to call the Hausa boys to use there wheelbarrow to convey the nursery to the farm, they charged 24,000. na wa ohhhh

Now the next stage is for me to plant. My mum's brother did one of these Agricultural causes is school, so he is a professional when planting oil palms.

We used a spacing is 8.7feet. you heard me clear, 8.7 feet. while they where doing the measurement, you know when planting oil palm, you have to do pegging, some hard roots was sitting on the sport where he was suppose to plant the oil palm, there was so much roots on the ground, we called the Hausa people again, they charged me 30,000 to uproot all the hard roots. so work continued. As am specking now, they have finished planting the 1755 oil palms. They would be buying more 200 palms because its like the land is more bigger than with i was told.

While am putting these here is for the new people that wants to go into farming. People, if you must go into farming, you must have money..... The more you go into it, the more unforeseen issues comes, and if you don't have cash to solve the issue immediately, your work would be suspended.

Also it does not end in just planting, there are still lots of things to be done before the said three years when you would starting harvesting.


So far so good, i have don't lots of mistakes in setting up mine oil palm plantation. If i have read some post that advices one on NL about setting up Oil palm plantation, i would not have made these silly mistakes.

if you are setting up an oil palm plantation.

Never you buy expensive lands.
Buy from NIFOR in your State not from outside your state
Let there me good motor able rood, so the vehicle conveying the palms can go into your land direct.
Make sure there is know roots in the ground that would disturb when planting


I would update later when more things comes into mine head

A lot of people wants to go into commercial farming, but keep thinking on the kind of crops to plant. As for me I believe oil palm is good, but the business is not for kids.

NOTE: Its not just about buying 100 hecters of land, but is about securing your land till eternity. Once you Acquire these lands, the villagers would be looking at you, the moment you start making good money from the plantation, beefing sets in. So as a plantation owner you must be ready to address these issues when they arise, Also if you are a young guy, the beefing would be much, because the mind set of the villagers would be how would these young boy be making money from the property they sold to you.

Also i have also come to understand that, even if you do not have money to start up your own plantation, you can build up your own milling factory. Building up a milling is expensive depending on the quantities of oil palm and palm kernel oil you want to be processing. If you buy a trailer full of palm fruit every week or every three days, then definitely you would need a higher processing machine. Also you have to buy a land where you would site your factory. But one can site his milling factory in his village if you always have at least 8 hours light everyday. As for me i still believe Oil palm is still the best, apart from cocoa and rubber because i have not done mine research to know which is better among the three.

According to a thread i read here on Nairaland, the OP said they have 30,000 oil palm trees. that is quite much... if you want to have that kind of investment now, first the oil palm nursery would cost 150 per Naira per Nursery Multipled by 30,000= 4.500.000. Secondly if you buy the land, you have to Survey the land. Surveying the land would cost you more than 8M. you can not buy that quantity of land and you would not survey the land. But i know by the time these 30,000 palm start fruiting, you would be making money just as Nigeria is making money from Crude oil. Also do you know that if you have just 150 palm, in a year it would give you about 2000 liters of palm oil? And 2000 liters palm oil would fetch you nothing less than 300k, then if you talking about the palm kernel oil, you would also get at least 100k. Do not forget, you would sell the Palm Kernel Cake and the palm oil pulb to those companies producing poultry foods. Then the last but not the least. The Kernel shell is also sold. You heard me right.... The kernel sell is sold for $25 per tone. I confirmed these a month ago, i placed a call to a Nigerian company and the company said they buy it for $25 per tone.

So if you are making 300k per annul for just 150 oil palm trees, then how much do you think the OP would be making with 30,000 trees? I know most readers would be calculating figures now, but do not forget you have to spend money too, but if well managed, you would be making millions as profit at the end of every year....

Following...

Adding this biz as one of my long term plans.

Also wanting to cheap in some ideas that just stumbled into mine head. One of the main reason most farmers dont make enough profit is because they spend more money hiring labour. Mine Plantation has not started yet, but due to what i have read and mine experence in mine present business, i know that the higher your hired Laboured, the lower your profit.

As for me, if i want to Harvest mine Palms, it would be mine staffs that would be harvesting, i would not hire Labour. Also to make your Harvest Fast and for your Staff not to get tired easily while harvesting, i would use a mechcalnized Harvesting tool. I dont know if you have seen this tool before... The tool is about 6inch long, it as a kind of generator at the base which you would start like a generator, then the otherside of the tool as an opening mouth. The tool has different harvesting technique, it is a sickle, cutlass, shovel mouth etc So when you want to harvest you just insert any the kind of technique you want to use and off you go. In two seconds you are through with a particular tree. So while waste your time paying villagers or a labourer 100 Naira to help you harvest just one tree? Also there is also another Machine you can use to weed your plantation? Just like those machines you see, those farmers use in triming grasses along Ikorodu road. Instead of hairing Labours to weed your plantation, just buy like 3pc of the machines and when your staffs are free in the factory, drive them down to the plantation for them to weed.

But in all, Management is still the key.... If you can manage your plantation well..... You would always be smiling to the bank.

Any farmer in the house should please shed some light on mine thread....................

I
am
intrested
in
your
topic.i
have
a
small
plantation,just
a
year
old.
Just
abt
seven
hectares.
Iam
willing
to
share
my
expirence
thus
far

Manweysabi: Adding this biz as one of my long term plans.

also make ur research on plaintain plantation....

felixzo1: I
am
intrested
in
your
topic.i
have
a
small
plantation,just
a
year
old.
Just
abt
seven
hectares.
Iam
willing
to
share
my
expirence
thus
far

Am waiting on hearing your experience.....

@ okine4real, congratulations to u in advance! u ve just created ur own money- tree 4 d next 35-40 yrs to come. d beginning is always difficult and challenging but d result is always rewarding. i like ur courage and kindnes to share ur experience with felow nairalanders.

Following Ur School ...........

I just acquire a acres of land in ogbomoso planning to go into the oil plantation..but i could not get a place to get the seedling..i was learnt tenera is the best nursery seed..please any body in oyo state where can i get to buy either in ibadan ogbomoso or ilorin does are the place closer to my place

You do not need the help of any body. With internet, you can get any information you are looking for in the world. http://www.nifor.org That is the link to Nigerian Institute For Oil Palm Research. They are the Government Organization that sells palm oil Nursery seedlings. Open the link, click on CONTACT US. call the General call Line and ask your questions. its 150 Naira per seedlings. you would be charged either 10 Naira or 20 Naira extra when they are loading the palms into your vehicle... Nigerian Institute For Oil Palm Research is in every state in the country, so just ask to know where it is located in the state you are located.....

I came across these on another thread on Nairaland... So i said i should copy it here and shed some light....


The OP Wrote

The palm kernel oil (grand nut oil) when refined is a lucrative and profitable business which many people do not know unless you have been into the sector.
It can be run in a small, medium and large scale. depending on the financial capacity of he who wants to set it up.
This is most profitable when it is been set up in the Eastern and Western Nigeria where the Palm Kernel Nuts PKN is found in a lager quantity.
Just take a look on the present analysis

THE ANALYSIS
(PKN = Palm kernel nut, PKO =Palm kernel oil, PKC =Palm kernel cake)
In every 25 metric tons of good palm kernel nut
(PKN) you are expected to get 10 metric tons of PKO and at least 13.5 metric tons of PKC

A ton of PKN = N 70,000 (presently)
A ton of PKO = N 195,000 (presently)
A ton of PKC = N 15,000 (presently)

25 ton of PKN = N1, 750,000
10 ton of PKO = N1, 950,000
13.5 ton of PKC = N 202,500

PKO + PKC – PKN = Gross profit
1,950,000
+ 202,500
2,152,500
- 1,750,000
402,500 GP = N 402,500

The Machine is designed to crush 10 tons of PKN in every 24hrs and this is to say that it is capable of crushing more than 40 metric tones every week at least.
So take it that, at least you where able to make 4 transactions in a month this will give you 402,500 x 4 = 1,610,000 take your wages and salary, Nepa bill, Maintenance to be N400,000 you will see that you will be having N1,210,000 as your net profit each month.

The OP forget to include the cost of Diesel.... in these country, you cant ever have 24 hours light...... so if you include the cost of diesel, definitely your profit would decrease.

Also the OP did not mention how many staff he employed in his factory.... If he has seven staff and he is paying lets say 20k each, the total would amount to 140k, these would also decrease the profit.


Okay sorry i did not read the part where the OP wrote about salaries, wages, NEPA bal bla bla.... But mine main concerns is, let the people really practicing these business really come up and speck. I have been reading lots figures people say they make as profit..... But mine concern is, are they really making that amount of profit they are talking about?

Thanks bro i will update you guys immediatly i get response from then and when am about to do the planting..i will be updating you at this stage..ve just contacted them still waiting for there response

That figure is actually correct from my own findings here...but the machines are not readily available here in nigeria for you to process on a large scale you need to order from malaysia ..the ones available in nigeria here can only process less than 10tons a day which is very small for you to make that kind of money

my experience with oil palm plantation.i started my own oil palm nursery in early 2011,with 1575 seeds,bought from nifor at N15000 per pack,each pack had 525 seeds. i grew the nursery for 14 months. by June 2012 i cleared land for planting. pegging was carried out, then digging and planting. 1050 trees were planted it took me almost 4 weeks with 10 men to carry out the all work on a 7 hectare farm. spacing for my palms was 7 meters by 7 meters in a triangle . first weeding and fertilizer application was carried out after 3 months. npk fertilizer was applied to each palm tree.second weeding was done 3 months latter,towards the end of the raining season.by may this yr, i had carried out first weeding and fertilizer application 1 bought 3 bags of npk fertilizers at N6800 per bag.(open market price, may2013) most of the labor was done by myself with the help of some relative.the land used is inherited land. the money i have spend thus far is around N250,000. pls watch this video if you can.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ed4Jy3oGmjY and
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eCgeD2gOc2U.

henrimoto: also make ur research on plaintain plantation....

i did little calculation on plantain plantation before i settled for oil palm plantation.

If you do plantain plantation... Some of your plantain would be stolen by villagers or farmers.. if they in the farm and they are hungry, they would easily harvest some plantain and use for break fast or lunch....

Also if you do plantain plantation, if you go for weeding or you just want to go know how your producing are doing... Sun would beat the hell out of you... Have you ever been to the farm when the sun is shining? you would not like you self.

Also i believe Plantain produces at least once in a year.... So you can compare the profit you would make if you do oil palm to plantain. In oil Palm, you would sell Palm Oil, Palm Kernel Oil, Palm Kernel cake you would even sell the Kernel shell...... lol

Also if you palm tree is grown, you can go to the farm anything because the palm fronts would be forming shades. So you do not have to worry about the sun.

But i must say it here... Oil Palm Plantation is not for a farmer that does not have money ohhhhh. Its cash consuming because you can wake up and you would be told you need 70k to just quickly fix something...and yet the palms has not yet starting producing palm fruits...

How about 5 million naira as a start for the farming project (Oil Plantation), lets say.if i have the required land already

@ okine4real. the points u gave about d disadvantages of planting a plaintain plantation are not strong enough 2 discourage a serious farmer or investor dat knows what plantain is. out of d 3 points u gave, d tu 1st points can b reduced 2 a minimal. it takes 9 mths 4 an improved plantain stem 2 grow and bear fruit. despite all these, oil palm has extra advantages over plantain tree. oil palm is a multi-beneficial tree if u can exercise patience 4 say : 3-4 yrs. let me ask, how often does d oil palm produces fruit in a year.

styles2009: How about 5 million naira as a start for the farming project (Oil Plantation), lets say.if i have the required land already

how big is d land? what is d soil texture...is it gud 4 oil palm farmin? has d land been cleared? if u do ur home work very well, 5m is enough to start u a gud oil palm plantation. take clue 4rm okine4real's experience. mr okine4real, whats ur own take on this...?

oil palm have numerous advantages over plantain farming and should not be compared. oil palm is a cash crop ,it has various uses and can be proceed in to different products . once planted oil palm can last for more than 30 years.plantain farming is also lucrative and can be easily mange on a small scale.it is labor intensive and highly perishable, it has lower processed value compared to oil palm.

styles2009: How about 5 million naira as a start for the farming project (Oil Plantation), lets say.if i have the required land already

5M is a lot of money...If you go by what @ felixzo1: said, he said he used a spacing of 7 meter triangle...which would eat lots of space.. But for me i used 8.7 feet. meaning i used about 3 meter spacing. If you go by @ felixzo1: spacing that means if you have one hecter which is 100M by 100M you would have about 200 to 250 palm... and with that you would get about 2200 liters of palm oil per year... As for me the oil is very small. So if you must go by @ felixzo1: spacing you must or should have like 200 hecter which would enable you plant about 31,000 palms. but if you go by mine own spacing believe me with just 10 hecters, you are sure of getting about 13,500 palms... with with 13,500 palms you are talking about sweet profit.

But i have not gone to the village to see how the crops are and how the spacing is, all i know is, i do all the calling from Lagos... If you are in Heaven and you have a phone No, i would place a call to you, so far i want to seek information from you. When mine mum was buying the palms from NIFOR, she asked the workers there, that we want to use a spacing of 8.7 Feet and the said its okay..

But if anybody wants to go by spacing of 7 Meter, pls go to inside the village and buy your lands.... go to where you would buy your land for 50k or 60k per plot. so if you buy the lands very cheap you would have lots of money available to buy like 1000 plots at once.


During the season of Palm fruits you harvest every 10 to 14days.. each palm tree shoots around 5 to 7 palm fruits around one tree.

There is even another specie of oil palm available now TENERA is even old specie.. The specie is called SUPER GENE OIL PALM.. Its all over Malaysia. The Supergene na die.... It shoots around 15 palm fruit at a time and the harvest time is 2years after planting.

The Reason while i chose palm tree over plantain is because certain people have lots of money to go into farm, but dont know which to go for, Some people are not ready to go into farming because its cheap.. some people wants to invest even 10M and also want to reap beautiful profit.. So if you that kind of man that has good money and you want to go into farming... then palm tree is for you

the recommended spacing for oil palm is 9 meters by 9 meters.giving 143 trees per hectare.(100m by 100m)oil palm reaches it maturity by 8 to 9 years. (oil palm start producing 3 yrs after planting)when fully matured a tenera spp. oil palm can give 12 fruits a year weighing between 35 to 45 kg,oil yield per hectare can reach 7200 liters .(http://www.fao.org/docrep/006/t0309e/T0309E03.htm)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palm_oil)my 7 m by 7m spacing is high density spacing and often not recommended. what you heard from nifor was 8.7metres not 8.7 feet. nobody will tell you to plant a tree at that density. watch the video i posted earlier and read the recommended links, before you make a big mistake.

felixzo1: the recommended spacing for oil palm is 9 meters by 9 meters.giving 143 trees per hectare.(100m by 100m)oil palm reaches it maturity by 8 to 9 years. (oil palm start producing 3 yrs after planting)when fully matured a tenera spp. oil palm can give 12 fruits a year weighing between 35 to 45 kg,oil yield per hectare can reach 7200 liters .(http://www.fao.org/docrep/006/t0309e/t0309e01.htm)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palm_oil)my 7 m by 7m spacing is high density spacing

I have heard about 10 Meter spacing, i have heard about 9 meter spacing. But when i contacted two different Specialist, one said 10 feet is okay and the other said 8.7 feet is also okay. Am just coming from a carpenters place now and i borrowed his tape. I just wanted to know what 8.7 feet was. 8.7 feet is wide as far as am concern... even a lorry is 8 feet wide because i had to even measure the breath side of a lorry, So as to know what am talking about. Even with 8.7 feet apart each palm tree leaves would not torch each other. Am not saying what i have done is write, but what am saying is, i still do not think i would have a serious disadvantage since when the palms grow to maturity their leaves would not torch each other.

@ felixzo1 i would still like to hear from you...

only plantain is planted a the density of 8.7feets. even twice than distance is not enough for oil palm. picture when the tree will be 7 yrs, the branches will get in each others way. there will be poor photosynthesis and poor absorption of nutrients due to over crowding. i highly recommend you go to the closest cafe and watch that video. seeing is believing ,a

okine4real:

I have heard about 10 Meter spacing, i have heard about 9 meter spacing. But when i contacted two different Specialist, one said 10 feet is okay and the other said 8.7 feet is also okay. Am just coming from a carpenters place now and i borrowed his tape. I just wanted to know what 8.7 feet was. 8.7 feet is wide as far as am concern... even a lorry is 8 feet wide because i had to even measure the breath side of a lorry, So as to know what am talking about. Even with 8.7 feet apart each palm tree leaves would not torch each other. Am not saying what i have done is write, but what am saying is, i still do not think i would have a serious disadvantage since when the palms grow to maturity their leaves would not torch each other.

@ felixzo1 i would still like to hear from you...

@okin4real, when will you process your first bottle of palm oil? The palm seedlings you bought are they hybrids or just palm seedling, if not hybrid, look forward from 5-10 yrs to enjoy your hard labour fruit
You didn't address the issue of fertilizers,security net fence around your farm, grass cutter loves to eat growing palm seedlings, the issue of next neigbour bush burning etc.
Palm plantation do not stop at its oil and kernel only, look beyond these, do some research and see how Malaysia that took palm seedling from Eastern Nigeria, under late Premier Micheal Okpara, turn it into extra huge monetary earner, where our great country are still satisfied by breaking its kernel to chew its seeds, and our lazy chemist goes into some hidden lab, and concoct chemical, pronto comes slow killing palm oil sold in most Nigeria markets

all the seeds sold at nifor are hybrid tenera spp. maturing at 3 yrs.

My seedlings are Hybrid called TENERA. For fertilizer i would wait ohh. I done spend 2.5Million already now.. haba abi you won kill me niii? I would apply fertilizer may be in 3months time. Security net Fence, I need to save lots of money for that kind thing because that would also run into millions.. Am still looking at buying another 100 plots. So may be by then i would know what to do about the security fencing. The issue of grass cutter mine mum said they can use scare crow or may be nets. But i think i would go for scare crow because its going to be cheaper i guess.

The issue of next neighbor....... these part skipped mine mind for real, i would look into these. The more i do research about oil palm the money i would need more money for the business. I dont want to kill mine self because of palm oil ohhhh, am just 31 years old. i would just take it easy, doing the oil palm plantation and the milling for now.. as time goes on, and as i chop better money... i would even refine palm kernel oil into groundnut oil.

Palm plantation do not stop at ....... pronto comes slow killing palm oil sold in most Nigeria markets[/quote] @ indegene, can u pls throw more light on this. thanks 4 ur comments.

@ indigene. pls. kindly throw more light on d last paragraph of ur comment.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jBV2RQhD6yo

Pls watch the youtube video... look at the spacing, i noticed in between palms there is lots of space. But dont you think the space is much.. Also that is the Super Gene specie i was talking about

@okine4real
Buying nursery from IMO state and transporting it to Delta state is not a prudent idea, cus u have NIFOR @ ur backyard in Benin. NIFOR in Benin sells nursery for #70 cus it is subsidized by Federal Gov. Each agric ministry from all states gets their supply of nurseries from NIFOR. States sells @ #150 cus they pay those that tend the nurseries before farmers pick it up. NIFOR in Benin sells a manual on oil palm production for #500 and on page 12 they recommend 9 meter spacing.Don't let ur greed cause u to shoot urself on the feet. No oil palm will strive with ur type of spacing. Planting should be done with collaring / canning at the same time, this is done to wade off rodent from eating the young nursery. Canning/collaring can be done using tin or wire mesh.