Introduction

Water logged wastelands		After treatment

I am practising agroforestry for last 20 years, particularly eucalyptus farming. When I used to work with Nasik District Eucalyptus Growers Association as a Chairman, and Chairman of Agroforestry Federation of Maharashtra, I had gained experience in all related activities from planting to harvesting and marketing of eucalyptus.

While doing field evaluation of genetically superior tissue culture clones, I had come actross one clone which was salt-tolerent, and could be grown in waterlogged wastelands, where PH and EC of the land was not suitable for conventional crops.

According to official estimates, in the Indian State of Maharashtra alone such problematic lands, that is waterlogged, having a high PH and EC are 4 million hectares . Once these lands used to be highly productive; but now a days they are either waste or yielding much less than the average yield of the area. So they are not commerically or economically viable. To bring back these lands to normalcy, the government and the farmers have tried conventional methods of digging trenches and or soil treatment. But these methods could not succeed according to expectations. Moreover, these methods are costly and time consuming.

I found lands having same problems at Kathargaon in Niphad Tehsil of Nashik district of Maharashtra State in India, and I had decided to experiment plantation of this waterlogged-tolerent clone of eucalyptus in these lands. By this plantation, the lands could be brought back to normalcy, and at the same time farmers would get income out of eucalyptus crops. I started my experiment through Agroforestry and Wastelands Development Foundation (NGO), and planted on January 1, 2000, an area measuring 1.17 hectares (approximately 3 acres). This plantation was harvested on January 14, 2004. Growth of eucalyptus was remarkably satisfactory, and there was improvement in soil conditions. Moreover, the participating farmer could get very good income. The observations of Kathargaon experiment are shared in this website. (Click here for the results of Nasik Experiment).

Vinayak Patil
Chairman, Agroforestry and Wastelands Development Foundation
(vinayakraopatil@yahoo.com)

The Experiment

Information on Farmer Participant

Name: Shyamrao Janardan Shinde
Village: Kathargaon
Taluka: Niphad
District: Nasik
State: Maharashtra
Country: India

Owned Land: 1.17 hectares
Waterlogged Wasteland: 1.17 hectares
Brought under eucalyptus plantation: 1.17 ha
Clone: ERK4 (Kalidas)
Date of Plantation: January 1, 2000
Date of Harvesting: January 14, 2004
Spacing: 10 feet by 4 feet
Total trees planted: 3350
Total trees survived: 3180
Trees kept for further experiment: 20
Trees cut earlier for tissue culture buds: 121
Date of which cut: September 2002
Total trees harvested: 3039
Total poles obtained: 6952
Total estimated cost(Rs.): 3,11,423
Actual realisation: 2,55,566
Other income from twigs and bark,own consumption(Rs.): 21,590
Total Income (Rs.): 2,77,156
Total Expenditure (Rs.): 97,594
Net Income (Rs.): 1, 79,562
Net Income per Year: (Rs.): 44,890
Net Income per year per acre (Rs.): 14, 963
Land pH was 8.77 before eucalyptus plantation and after first harvest i.e after four years pHwas 8.32