How To Start Peanut Farming (Groundnut) Business

Peanut or groundnut is one of the most important oilseed crops globally. Here in this post, we put a detailed peanut farming business plan sample checklist for your ready reference.

Peanut cultivation is easy. Additionally, the crop ensures satisfactory revenue to the growers. However, you must have a moderate size of land for groundnut cultivation. Commercial groundnut farming is a profitable business. Groundnut seed contains about 45% oil and 26% protein. Groundnut kernel as a whole is highly digestible. The scientific name of the peanut is Arachis hypogaea. And it belongs to the Legumes family.

It is seen, more than 100 countries grow groundnut. The major groundnut producers are China, India, Nigeria, the USA, Senegal, Myanmar, Indonesia, and Sudan (undivided). Developing countries account for over 97% of the world’s groundnut area and 95% of total production. India is the second-largest groundnut-producing nation in the world with an annual production of 5.64 million tons of pods after China. Major peanut-producing states are Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Orissa, and Uttar Pradesh.

Economic Importance of Peanut Farming

Groundnut oil is edible oil. It finds extensive use as a cooking medium both as refined oil and Vanaspati Ghee. Additionally, soap manufacturers, cosmetics, and lubricants industries are the major consumer of this oil. People also eat kernels as raw, roasted, or sweetened. They are rich in protein and vitamins A, and B, and some members of the B2 group. Their calorific value is 349 per 100 grams. Generally, the H.P.S. type of groundnut kernels has great export potential. The residual oilcake contains 7 to 8% of N, 1.5% of P 2O5, and 1.2%of K2O and is used as a fertilizer.

In addition, it is an important protein supplement in cattle and poultry rations. It is also popular as a confectionary product. Additionally, you can use the cake for manufacturing artificial fiber. The haulms (plant stalks) are fed ( green, dried, or silaged) to livestock. Groundnut shell is used as fuel for manufacturing coarse boards, cork substitutes, etc. Groundnut is also a great rotation crop. Due to the legume with root nodules, it can synthesize atmospheric nitrogen and therefore improve soil fertility.

Health Benefits of Peanut

Some of the health benefits of peanuts are listed below:

• First of all, peanut contains health-benefiting nutrients, minerals, antioxidants, and vitamins that are essential for optimum health.
• Additionally, peanut kernels are a good source of dietary protein; compose fine quality amino acids that are essential for growth and development.
• Peanuts are an excellent source of resveratrol, another polyphenolic antioxidant.
• The kernels are an excellent source of vitamin E (a-tocopherol); containing about 8 g per100 g.
• Finally, nuts are a rich source of minerals like copper, manganese, potassium, calcium, iron, magnesium, zinc, and selenium.

Things To Consider in Commercial Peanut Farming

• In commercial farming, you must have a comprehensive business plan with you. According to the area of land, you will need to calculate the input cost, production output, and revenue earnings.
• Additionally, you must have a marketing plan with you. Before planting, plan about the proper selling avenues of the crops.
• You must have well-drained soil for cultivation.
• Additionally, you must use suitable rotation crops.
• In addition, you must have a proper irrigation facility.
• Finally, proper time management of the crop is crucial.

Best Varieties For Peanut Farming

Variety selection is one of the most important decisions in peanut production. Newer varieties have resistance to multiple diseases. Many factors affect the selection of what varieties to plant including field history, irrigation, planting and harvest capabilities, seed availability and quality, and marketing. Here we put a list of some major varieties. The list includes Florida-07, FloRunTM ‘107’, Georgia-02C, Georgia-06G, Georgia-07W, Georgia-09B, Georgia-10T, Georgia-12Y etc.

India is the second-largest producer of groundnuts in the world. Indian groundnuts are available in different varieties: Bold or Runner, Java or Spanish, and Red Natal. The main Groundnut varieties produced in India are Kadiri-2, Kadiri-3, BG-1, BG-2, Kuber, GAUG-1, GAUG-10, PG-1, T-28, T-64, Chandra, Chitra, Kaushal, Parkash, Amber, etc.

Agroclimatic Condition For Peanut Farming

Groundnut is essentially a tropical plant. It requires a long and warm growing season. The most favorable climate conditions for groundnut are the well-distributed rainfall of at least 50 cm during the growing season, an abundance of sunshine, and relatively warm temperatures.

It is observed that plants will grow best when the mean temperature is from 21-26.5°C. Lower temperatures are not suitable for its proper development. During the ripening period, it requires about a month of warm and dry weather.

Suitable Soil For Peanut Farming

Groundnut thrives best in well-drained sandy and sandy loam soils, as light soil helps in easy penetration of pegs and their development and also harvesting. Clay or heavy soils are not suitable for this crop, as they interfere with the penetration of pegs and make harvesting quite difficult. Additionally, groundnut gives good yields in the soil with a pH between 6.0-6.5.

Read: How To Take Soil Samples For Analysis?

Peanut Farming Basic Steps

1. Land Preparation

Although groundnut is a deep-rooted crop but looking at its underground pod-forming habit, you must avoid deep plowing. Because deep plowing encourages the development of pods in deeper layers of soil. And it makes harvesting difficult. One plowing with soil turning plow followed by two harrowings is sufficient to achieve a good surface tilt up to 12-18 cm depth. One or two summer cultivations will minimize weeds, insects, and pests to a great extent in problem areas.

2. Seed Sowing

The quality of seeds is of utmost importance for establishing the optimum plant stand. Therefore, you must use only bold seeds for sowing. Treat the selected kernels with 5 g of Thiram or Captan or Ceresan per kg of kernels so as to check various seed and soil-borne diseases.

3. Manuring

Just like the other legumes, groundnut meets the major part of the nitrogen requirement through nitrogen fixation. However, you can apply 20-40 kg of nitrogen per hectare as a starter dose to meet the nitrogen requirement of the crop in the initial stage in poor fertility soils. In addition, a farmyard is also the best option for peanuts.

4. Irrigation

Generally, groundnut does not require irrigation. However, if a dry spell occurs, irrigation is necessary. Therefore, you must provide one irrigation at the pod development stage. However, you must have a well-drained field.

Give the first irrigation at the start of flowering and the subsequent irrigations whenever required during the fruiting period to encourage peg penetration and pod development. The last irrigation before harvesting facilitates the full recovery of pods from the soil.

5. Plant Protection

You must protect your farm from different types of pest and disease attacks. And seed treatment plays an important role in prevention. Some of the potential diseases are Tikka, Sclerotium Rot, Rosette, Charcoal Rot, etc.

6. Harvesting & Yield

When you find a considerable amount of developed crops, you can harvest peanuts. Generally, the nut takes two months to attain full development. In the case of a bunch type of groundnut, you can harvest the plants by pulling. In peanut farming, you can expect about 15-20 quintals of pods per hectare from bunch-type varieties and 20-30 quintals per hectare from spreading varieties.