Don’t sacrifice food crops for Jatropha'
By Bongile Mavuso

LOCALS have been encouraged to use their own land to grow jatropha
plant which will be used to produce bio- fuel by D1- BP Fuels.

The company already has land allocated to ploughing the crop at Hluti
and Croydon but it is still not enough as they are still about 8 000
hectares short.

One of the Directors Gaetan Ning said they do not encourage people to
give up their food crops and sacrifice land for jatropha but can use
unused fields.

Ning said farmers can simply use land reserves that divide their
fields, especially in the rural areas, which would also protect their
food crops like maize, grown in the field. One of the agriculturalists
at the D1 Oil farm at Hluti, Solomon Masuku, said ploughing the tree
around one’s field can protect the crops in the field from livestock
as cattle and goats do not consume it. “Most Swazis have known the
tree for a very long time as it had been growing wild and sometimes
used as hedge. Others would plant it to easily identify graves in a
community graveyard. It can grow to up to six metres but the size can
be controlled. However, people can spare up 500 hectares for minimum
profit,” he said. Ning stated that the crop was good for bio- mass
production and a lot of studies go into the plant to check oil content
and other qualities of the different jatropha plants as they sometimes
vary. Meanwhile, Masuku said people need to treat jatropha like a
vegetable that needs special attention when it is still a seedling as
it may sometimes lead to stagnant growth of crop when not treated with
proper care. “The first six months are the most vital and the plant
needs special care for that long. Good husbandry is important,” he
added. He said the demand for the crops was high from locals and they
still needed more people to come forth and get the seedlings grown in
their nursery.
http://www.observer.org.sz/main.php?id=40147&section=Business