Jatropha has great potential to grow on lands, that are not productive for food crop. Jatropha yields oil in smallest time frame as compared to all other trees. Since a small area around the plant is provided with fertilizer, the requirement of fertilizer is 10% of the other crops. Since 90% of area is not supplied with fertilizer, nothing grows on that land. In good / forest lands Jatropha can be inter-cropped with Castor. Income and oil production from Castor starts from first year itself.

Jatropha is planted in 3 x 2 meters matrix. This has 1,600 plants in a hector. The plant when fully grown has a diameter of 1 meter. Two plants merge into each other in the 2 meters gap, while there is a free space of 1 meter in 3 meters gap. This gap is required for harvesting.

Jatropha starts fruiting after first hot (summer) season, but yield is low as jatropha plant has few branches. When Jatropha is pruned every year, number of branches grow, and the fruits are more due to more braches. You get full yield, when branches are around 40. This may take 3 to 5 years.

The number of seeds depend on branches, which depends on proper pruning. In India, we get 1/2 kg per plant.

The oil content of seed with cover is around 27 to 33%, with an average of 30%. The oil content in white kernel is 60%. When expelled, you can get oil which is 25% of seed with cover.

Jatropha can be done on fallow lands, requires less amount of water and fertilizer, yields non-edible oil in 3 years. Jatropha is good for forestration of desert lands with water from locally treated waste water. Jatropha is good for rural employment and rural energy security. Jatropha is also good for degraded forest and desert lands.

Jatropha can be planted in fields of size ranging from 1 to 10 acres for one farmer to 1,000 acres for large plantation companies. Income will be proportionate to size of field.

Jatropha Saplings are generally prepared from Seeds or Branches. Those produced from branches, yield fruits faster. Hybrid and Clonal varieties are also available now.

Seedlings grown from seeds have a tap root, which helps in droughts and cyclones. Jatropha can collect water from deep soil and anchors the tree. Cuttings do not have tap root, but seeds are obtained much earlier from trees of these saplings.

These are done in Green / Net Houses for large scale production. Jatropha is done in 1% of the plantation area, directly in soil bed. The production cost of seedling is higher, but these are stronger as proper care is taken for first 3 months. If individual farmer produces seedlings in field, Jatropha is much cheaper.

Controlled Environmental Chamber helps in initial growth of saplings. Jatropha growth is good and more saplings survive well in plantations.

Organic farming is better as Organic fertilizers are natural and requires lesser amounts of fertilizers and pesticides.

Disease Control is much easier in nurseries as young saplings are attacked by pests in first 3 months. Also plants are stacked in smaller area in closed chambers, so individual attention can be provided to all saplings.

Jatropha is good for employment for rural poor people. In India, its oil is used for lighting the lamps and in Soap manufacture, as other edible oils, like palm, used so far are very expensive (prices have doubled). Jatropha has bright future in India, as our country is densely populated and soil is good, largely due to organic farming techniques used for last hundreds of years. Many countries in Africa where area is not populated, the expenses for roads and townships that need to be set up are prohibitive. This makes africa less attractive. In south east asia conditions are good but labour costs are double that of India.

India and Myanmar's share will always be more than 50% as the land is organic and labour is quite inexpensive. There is a lot of manual work in plantation, pruning and harvesting. Machines for planting, pruning and harvesting are not yet developed.

It will not be possible to satisfy local demand and export to other countries is unlikely.

1 liter of oil is produced from 3 to 4 kgs of seeds. The seed cost is currently around Rs. 12 to 14 per kg and cost of extraction is Rs. 2 per liter of oil.

In India, nobody can hold more than 50 acres of land, hence most plantations are scattered on small lands. These are owned by the people who work on their own land. These are close to their villages. These are taken care manually, and yield best results.

There are two methods. Screw type oil expeller is used for small scale activity (1 to 10 tons of oil per day) and Solvent extraction for capacities more than 100 tons of oil per day. You can get 25% oil from an expeller, while 30% from solvent extraction.

Jatropha is planted in 3 X 2 meters square configuration. This allows us to plant 400 plants per acre or 1,600 plants per hectare. Castor is planted as intercrop for first two years, if the land is fertile.

Contract farming works well where the supply is much more than demand and the processing machinery is expensive and processing is difficult. Contract farming is not the case in Jatropha. Farmers may sell Jatropha seeds to some one offering higher price than the contract price or produce Jatropha oil and use Jatropha oil for his own lighting needs.

These are Jatropha Curcas, Pongamia Pinnata, Mahua, Castor, Simarouba, Kokam etc. Jatropha Curcas and Pongamia Pinnata are plantations, which produce non edible oil. Castor is a crop, which can be harvested in 4 months. Castor too gives non edible oil and is grown as intercrop within Plantations. Simarouba, Kokam and Mahua is also a plantation, which gives edible oil.

You can get 0.5 tons of Castor seeds in first and second year and 1.5 tons of Jatropha seed from third to fifth year. You can get higher yields after 5 years. Jatropha will yield seeds for 40 to 50 years.

In Power Generating sets, oil is burnt at high temperature (100^o C or higher). At that high temperature, viscosity reduces considerably. Any unit generating 1 megawatt or higher can burn the oil directly.

An expeller plant is required to extract oil from seeds. The size of expeller unit can be 1 MT / day (Capital Cost Rs. 700,000) or 1 MT / hour (Capital Cost Rs. 3,000,000) or 2 MT / hour (Capital Cost Capital Cost Rs. 5,000,000). These values are indicative and you should get fresh quotes from expeller manufacturers. Depending on the capacity of the plant the cost of expelling oil will be between Re. 0.19 per liter to Re 0.90 per liter of oil.

Castor is the best inter crop in fallow land and Corn or Soya in fertile land. These are energy crops and yield income in 4 months.

This is not a good idea. When Palm or Rubber tree grows Palm or Rubber tree covers entire floor area, and less sunlight is available for Jatropha and Jatropha can not survive after few years.

Intercropping of traditional food crops is not recommended as Jatropha is non edible, and mixing it with edible crops is dangerous. Jatropha should be planted on boundaries of fields.