With statistics showing that post harvest losses account for up to 40 per cent of total yield, one Kiambu County farmers has decided to first locate the market before growing cucumber.
Gabriel Njoroge, who is also a tomato farmer, searched for cucumber suppliers to the high-end vegetable outlets within Nairobi before embarking on production of the fruit which is in Thika.
The supplier has agreed to buy the produce at a cost ranging from Sh45 to Sh60 per kilo-depending on the quality of the harvest for one year.
No guaranteed market
Unlike tomatoes, which are household cooking ingredients for almost all classes of people, the farmer said one is likely to sink into losses for blindly investing in cucumber if they do not know the target consumers.
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Having sold tomatoes for one and half years in Nairobi, Njoroge contacted and struck a deal with a friend who buys cucumbers in large quantities before selling them to Nairobi supermarkets, Wakulima Market and Gikomba.
Growing sets
“The buyer asked me to grow five sets of 100 seedlings each. The sets must have an age difference of two to three weeks. This difference will be maintained through the growth process until harvesting. For that reason, I will be supplying given kilogrammes of cucumbers every week,” he said.
The first set is two weeks old and by the time Farmbiz Africa caught up with Njoroge, he was transplanting the second batch.
Besides ensuring constant revenue flow for the farmer, the variation in transplanting date regulates the supply to the market, therefore, avoiding flooding, which reduces costs.
Irrigation
In sustaining the supply through the year, he has bought two tanks of 500 litres each to support irrigation. He relies on his father’s 1976 pump to push water from a nearby river into the farm. He is using drip after abandoning can irrigation.