Is Cabbage Farming Profitable ? Insights on Agronomic Nuances

A beautiful good afternoon, good evening wherever you're watching us from. This is yours truly, Mr. Panuka from here at Panuka Farm in Zambia. I hope you're having a good time here. It's quite a lovely day. The sun is just about an hour to setting and yeah always come to that lovely you know ambience to it. So I am in a you know cabbage you know field here and I think we've actually presented this crop on our YouTube channel. You can actually just trace back and watch some of the other you know old you know videos when this crop was actually quite you know young. So we just came out of winter, cold season and you know too well that you know brassicas are actually you know very good friends you know with you know winter. So we always you know try and just squeeze in you know a brassica you know crop during you know winter. Yeah that's the name of the game in farming you know trying to squeeze you know something quick if it actually grows you know very well you know during you know that you know period. And yeah the crop is just about to get you know ready and so what I'll just do is to just walk you through you know this crop to see how lovely it looks and just give you some you know further you know tidbits on how you get yourself such a lovely you know crop such as you know what I have right behind me. So tag along. So what we have here is around nine to ten thousand you know heads of cabbage that you know we transplanted just in the midst of you know the cold season and this is how you know this you know crops look like at present. One thing that we can actually note much as the cabbage is actually doing well is that we probably squeezed this cabbage a bit you know it's a bit too tight but we're still getting some very decent you know heads that are coming up obviously they don't get ready at the same time. So these are the kind of heads that are coming up and the target is to have an average of five you know kgs of heads. That is what sells with the kind of market that we are targeting. So something like this getting bigger you can see more heads there the other you know line coming up more heads here. So with a bit more spacing I think we'd have actually had much bigger and better sizes of you know heads but still produce quite some spectacular you know cabbage you know crop still growing and one thing that you actually note is that this crop you know was produced with less you know attack of what is called diamond you know black moth. So diamond black moth basically manifests itself with a lot of holes on the leaves but you can actually see these are scars from the time the crop was actually young. We managed to actually arrest this you know diamond black moth and so as this crop was actually growing you'd actually see that we took full control in terms of just managing this DBM and that's how we ended up with such a lovely you know crop. So usually the head formation is not always uniform. We've got two varieties here. There's Mashadu by Rarigzwan as well as Kilimo. So we're already seeing some differences in the head formation yeah but overall you can actually see some very lovely you know more heads still in you know formation stage. So there's need for a bit more of water you know at this stage of this crop but obviously as soon as the heads start to really form you need to know when to withdraw the water to avoid you know the rotting of cabbage. So it's something to watch. You've got to you know go around and make sure that you you know ensure that there's no rotting that's happening. Know when to take off your foot in terms of irrigation so that you end up with a very good you know cabbage crop. So DBM one of the biggest menaces that's something that you've got to take care of but also you need to make sure that there's quite some very right you know calcium balance to avoid having hollow you know heads. That happens sometimes when you cut the cabbage you find it's got some spaces usually that's a calcium imbalance and that also leads to a lightweight you know cabbage you know head. So you want to make sure that there's a good calcium balance that creates a very compact you know head coupled with the right amount of water and then you're off to a good you know cabbage crop. So those are some of the critical you know tidbits you've got to take care of and like we indicated also some right spacing. I think what we have here is a bit tight but we fed it well took care of it and that's why we're still having some decent you know heads despite a bit of you know too close you know distance between the cabbage you know plant stations. So yeah that's your cabbage that's our cabbage here and how it's doing you know thus far and pretty soon yeah heading to the market. Like we indicated this kind of a one-off batch we don't you know proceed with cabbage you know production during the summer. Obviously this is a crop that is quite hungry on water but again it's not really part of our you know our perennial you know crops. So obviously maybe one of the lingering you know questions you'd be asking is despite just the water issue is cabbage not a profitable crop for you to actually do all year round? Apparently it's actually a very profitable you know crop that you can actually do all year round except you know it's a numbers game kind of crop you need to produce quite a bit I think your batches must be something like this like one batch but again remember you know farming especially horticulture farming has three you know aspects to it just like any other crop price the quantity that you produce and obviously also the frequency at which you actually get to market and so if you're going to go into you know cabbage production the issue is that you probably need to put in this much you know of a crop every week okay ten thousand heads and then take to market almost every week you know something like five to ten thousand heads so it also chills quite a bit of land space then you're also looking at pressure on the water but if you actually look at the offtake in terms of quantity that you can actually take to market I would actually say cabbage is quite elastic just like tomato but obviously it's a bit of noise in terms of pricing but at the moment I think the pricing is around you know five quarter I've been perspective and usually it kind of remains there buoyant almost all year round so if you want to go into cabbage farming I think it's a profitable you but take into account I think those nuances of the fact that you probably have to be putting in the ground you know this much of cabbage every week so remember it's your necessary management and then you've got to transplant you know and then take care so there's quite a bit of land that you actually need and some very good irrigation you know systems to actually it's a good crop but just make sure that you understand those fundamentals that we've just highlighted yeah so hope this has been a juicy you know video that's given you a bit of insights in terms of just cabbage farming that's if you're looking at it from you know a longevity perspective in terms of you know production so from yours truly Mr Panuka have a lovely one bye