In an effort to circumvent these inherent problems a few organisations involved in potato farming in Zimbabwe have embarked on a scheme to produce potato seedlings from ‘True Potato Seed’ with the idea that farmers can now produce their very own seed potato tubers thereby ensuring the authenticity of their ‘seed’ crop and have virus- free plantings.
Should you require further information in this regard, it would do you a power of good to join our next class and I feel it would be in your interests to visit some of these farms where they can demonstrate to you these benefits and show you from seedling to field and beyond.
I have been asked by a lot of people on how much is invested in terms of absolute figures. That is quite a difficult question as it depends with a lot of factors. The figures Iam providing you are Industry averages of the best there is. I know you can gamble and buy at a cheaper price but that will be a gamble. We want to groom professionals here at ziminvestors.com.
You require 55000 potato seedlings per ha @ $.05/seedling which translate to $2,750.00. There are other companies which sell potato tubers and I think the cost per hectare is in the region of $4,000.00 per ha for seed ‘tubers’. Seedlings are grown to produce ‘seed’ tubers for your commercial crop and are not grown to replace a commercial crop through the growing of seedlings.
The growing costs, Fertilisers, chemicals etc. are explained briefly in other articles here at ziminvestors.com hence the need for you to come and attend training. I am only concerned with explaining the production of seedlings in this article not the actual production of the potatoes and therefore would hate to lead you astray with false figures.
Potato production is one of the more expensive operations in farming and so I reiterate you need training and get the whole picture to avoid costly mistakes. There are suppliers of potato seed in Zimbabwe who also provide grower’s guides. That may be helpful too. Hope I am not being too unhelpful but better to make the mistakes before spending your hard earned cash
A certain seed supplier is claiming that large sized potatoes can be harvested for sale at the market from True Potato Seed(TPS). My question is simple: Is TPS for producing seed potato alone, or it can also produce potatoes for the market. I fear that lots of people do not understand the difference, and will be duped by these seed suppliers.
Thanks Gerry for bringing this up. TPS is mainly for seed production even up to the third generation. I normally dont recomend it for food potato though some suppliers do
Hie, I would like my dad to attend the potato training course in Bulawayo on the 5/4/14. Pliz let me know where it is held and the cost.
What are the requirements
The requirements are a handful and cannot all be put here on the comments tab. I wrote a 64 paged document on that.
where can I find true potato seeds in Zimbabwe and how much do I need for a 4ha piece of land
thnx so much for such an informative blog, iam in Honde valley and would like to venture into both potato and fish farming. may i know the dates for your July 2015 training, fees and venue. where can i buy your potato hand book?
thnx so much for such a blog. iam in Honde valley and i would like to venture into potato and fish farming. may i know the dates of your JULY 2015 training, the fees as well as the venue. where can i get the potato manual?