New crop science is an area of tremendous interest to our company. We have participated with our state universities on several projects studying crops ranging from jatropha to pongmia. We have also worked within the private sector on mechanical harvest prototypes extensively.
It is very important to everyone involved that research crops and commercial crops are treated separately on the farm level. Thousand acre plus farming operations are no place for unproven crops, methods or risks. Invasive species and other threats can prove to be an environmental and economic disaster for a young industry like feedstock farming.
Jatropha has tremendous potential as a high yielding oil seed crop in Florida and is easily mechanically harvested with the BEI jatropha harvester. Because of its sensitivity to frost during its juvenile stage (1-4 years) jatropha has been slow to establish in Florida. Perhaps that is best, because the farmers can depend on institutions like The University of Florida and the University of South Florida to conduct frost tolerance studies and develop the best strains for integration into Florida agriculture down the road.
Please contact us for up to date information on Florida jatropha tests, and feel free to visit our test fields. We believe jatropha will have a place in commercial feedstock farming very soon. We have helped numerous other farms start up in several friendly nations where frost is not an issue and jatropha is a perfect option for their climates. In this consulting capacity we have designed feedstock farms around jatropha intercropped with other oil seeds and mechanical harvest integration.
