Steps of starting a farm business

When starting a farm business you need to make up your mind where to begin! Starting a business can be overwhelming as it involves several steps. Start by evaluating the Business Idea using market research. You may think your business idea is genius just because there’s nothing like it in the market , but on the contrary it may be a warning sign that there simply no market for the idea. Before rushing into starting your farm business, you should ensure there are enough customers whom you are targeting will buy your farm products or services. The more you know about your consumers, the better the chances of success of your marketing efforts. This exercise is called market research. 

There are several ideas to help you in the above research. You can hire market research companies or do simple research using the following considerations? Who are your target customers are, their numbers, where they live, their ages, how much money they spend on comparable services / products per week, whom you are competing with, What will make your farm business unique? Make a business plan in order to know how much sales you require to break even and make a profit. The market research will help you determine whether your idea is practical and worthwhile pursuing or not.

A partnership farm business requires a wise choice of co-founders whom you can work well with, whose skills complement yours. Choosing business partners who have a variety of skills is the key to success of a starting a business. This means if you are good at customer service but disorganized when it comes to administration, get a person who is organized with great attention to details for administrative work, while you deal with customer service. Choosing farm Business Structure is the next step. Once your idea is past the market research step, and you’ve decided whether to have co-founders or not, decide on the type of business structure best for your company. If ideally research shows that there is  no need for retail establishment, and you decide execution of your idea is to start from  a home office, you may be able to operate  a sole proprietorship.In this case Choose a private company business structure. However if you have co-founders, consider other forms of Farm business structures, such as partnerships,  a Corporation or a Limited Liability Corporation.

Africa Environment Day is Renamed Wangari Maathai Day

Africa Environment  Day is celebrated every of 3rd March since the year 2000.The day was set aside to raise awareness of the pressing environmental challenges facing the continent. During the African Union Summit held in Addis Ababa Ethiopia in February 2012, the African Union chose to honour the late professor wangari maathai by renaming Africa Environment Day Wangari Maathai Day, for her great contribution to environmental awareness in Africa especially in aforestation and reforestation.Great contribution was made by the late professor Wangari Maathai. Professor Wangari Mathai fought several battles with wisdom and diplomacy to save the environment. This made her a winner of the prestigious Nobel Peace Prize which was awarded her in Oslo Norway in Dec 2004.She has left a legacy which will outlive her and the battle continuous.

Agroforestry, farm forestry, community forestry, social forestry and village forestry are all terms used to describe growing of trees undertaken mainly outside gazetted forest zones. Agro-forestry has received much attention in the development efforts of rural Kenya over the years. Tree planting projects have been supported by government extension services as well as well as non governmental organizations. Increasing the tree cover from about 2% to 10% is the government policy in Kenya. However lack of seeds has often led to poor achievements in tree planting as the supply from central seeds stores is unreliable. Local seed collection is the answer to ensuring timely supplies of seeds, furthermore indigenous tree are adapted local area conditions. It is very easy to collect seed for on farm small nurseries. Simply observe the flowering and fruiting of various tree species to know when mature seeds are available. This varies from species to species and from one part of Kenya to the other.

Collect only mature seeds for good germination percentage and from trees that resemble what you want i.e. species for timber from straight trees, species for fodder from trees with high production of leafy biomass and species for fruit from good tasting and high yielding trees. Collect seed which has not been attacked by insect or fungi.Extract collected seeds from pods, cones or fruit and allow drying. Seeds which are oily or soft are recommended to be sown immediately and should not be stored ,while those with a hard cover may usually be stored. When storing keep the seed clean, cool, dry and protected from insects and rats. Label containers with name of the species and Date of collection. As Professor wangari maathai said “It’s the little things that citizens do which makes the difference and she quote “My little thing is planting trees” That one “little” thing led Wangari Maathai, who 
died September 25^th 2011, to found a movement by name the green belt movement, that not only planted over 47 million trees worldwide, including re-foresting her native country Kenya, but had improved the lives of over 900,000 women through economic empowerment by the year 2011.

Cold Weather Shiitake and 

the Magic Tablecloth

Written by Mary Ellen

I love the tale of the Magic Tablecloth. It’s Russian. A culture renowned for its love of mushrooms and picnics in the woods. This tablecloth can produce a feast at the utter of a command.

Well, you too may have the concept of such a cloth if you have cold weather strain shiitake mushrooms in your woods. These mushrooms keep on the logs for a long period of time; over a month, magically ready at the warming of the pan. Your woodland garden becomes a grocery store in the spring, each mushroom ebbing and swelling in size with passing spring thunder storms, intermittent dry winds and snow showers.

This cold weather strain “Chocolov” could easily be mistaken for a chocolate truffle!

Cold weather shiitake are dense and meaty; well known, for such qualities by vegetarians.

Spring shiitake, as a commercial crop, are hard to manage here in the upper Midwest. This is not so in the South where they can fruit on and off through the winter months. Parts of the country that maintain long stretches of temperatures where daytime highs range from the 30’s to the 50’s can achieve abundant harvests by misting pinning logs. But we are windy and cold… wait, hot….wait! Cold weather shiitake, trying to break loose from chilly, stalwart bark, starts and stops and starts to grow. It’s amazing to me that we saw our first full-sized spring shiitake on March 7th. I just picked those very same mushrooms last night for dinner, April 18th. 

On the log since early March, we’ll be enjoying this cold weather “Bellwether” this May Day if the weather stays cool!

It’s also difficult to keep the mushrooms from drying out in the spring. You can wet a fruiting blanket and cover the pinning logs, but keeping the blanket wet is difficult with stiff spring winds. You can tarp the wet blanket with plastic... perhaps too much work to manage unless you have all your cold weather strains consolidated. Otherwise, mushrooms can dry right on the log and can be weird, contorted and vericolored. It can be difficult to tell the stage of these mushrooms by simply looking at their caps... check the gills to see if they are white, not yellowing or brown, which indicates they’re not past their prime.   

Mushrooms with gold colored gills and leathery caps may not recover from wind and heat, and may be best off on the dryer tray. (The bite marks on the smaller mushroom above are probably from a white-footed mouse, who doesn't mind a mushroom a little past its prime!)

Much like the magic tablecloth, the shiitake possess their own secret charms. Give them a rainstorm and a little heat, and the hard dry lumps transform into gorgeous, thick caps with a mosaic of brown colors and geometric shapes. Given a hot/cold spring like we’ve had, we’ll be harvesting cold weather shiitake well into May. Just in time for picnics in the woods as we look for Morels!

These lumpy mushrooms, given enough moisture, will develop into gorgeous specimens.

Quick stir fry with frozen filet beans from last year's garden, and a finish of oyster sauce sprinkled with sesame seeds, makes an utterly satisfying dish.

“And somehow or other it had covered itself with dishes and plates and wooden spoons with pictures on them, and bowls of soup and mushrooms and kasha, and meat and cakes and fish and ducks, and everything else you could think of, ready for the best dinner in the world.”  - Ransome, Arthur. Old Peter's Russian Tales. London and Edinburgh: T. C. & E. C. Jack, Ltd., 1916.

Image above - Mikhail Sukharev. Magic Tablecloth.

Peanut butter for income generation and Nutrition

Peanut butter is a perfect spread for sandwiches which is made from roasted salted or sweetened peanuts. It is popular among adults and children alike in addition to being rich in nutrients, providing over 30 vital nutrients and phytochemicals. The nutrients include niacin, fiber, magnesium, manganese folate, phosphorus and vitamin E. They also contain about 25% protein, and exceeds proportion in any other true nut. They have been used to help fight malnutrition by famine relief organizations like the World Health Organization, UNICEF. Doctors without Borders have also promoted the use of these products to help save malnourished children in developing countries. A research that was carried out in the United States revealed that 1-2% of the population had allergic reactions the products   exposure with symptoms ranging from watery eyes to anaphylactic shock, for which treatment should be sought without delay. Use high quality and avoid moldy peanuts as they produce a carcinogenic substance called aflatoxin.

 Ingredients to make peanut butter include:-

1kg shelled and roasted peanuts

½ cup sugar

1 ½ tablespoon salt

1 cup cooking oil

The procedure of making the peanut butter is as follows:-

Remove the red or pink skin in preparation for making the peanut butter.

Mix all the ingredients and grind using an electric blender or a grinding stone.

Blend the mixture to a paste consistency

Pack and sell for income generation and self employment