 Agronomic knowledge how to grow Moringa oleifera in a semitropical/tropical

environment including soil preparation/ improvement, planting, fertilization and harvest

of the plants.
 Reproduction of seeds and the needed technology, to transfer the biomass as a whole into
different, usable products.
 Set up of the needed Industry and usage of the obtained fractions after processing the
plants.

 Moringa has so far shown the highest productivity per ha and year and offers a series of
important sub products like up to 10% fermentable sugars, 8% Starch, 7 to 8% oil with
mainly ohmega 3 fatty acid, 17% high quality protein and as well up to 35% cellulose for
the paper industry
 The total dry mass per ha and year in adequate soil can reach up to 120 tons harvested in
ten cuts per year
 Adjacent industries can work at full capacity the whole year around
 The main product, hormone rich juice has a growth enhancing effect in all till today
applied crops in the range of minimum 25 to 35%
 Moringa production can be fully mechanized

1. Introduction

The Moringa tree is a tree originating from the southern Himalaya area, northeast of India,
Bangladesh, Afghanistan and Pakistan.

In the last three centuries the species was introduced in nearly all tropical regions of the planet as
an ornamental plant and can be found 16 degree of latitude south to 14 degree of latitude north
from sea level up to 1800 meter above sea level.

The tree reaches a height of some 7 to 12 meters and a stem diameter of 20 to 40 cm, with an
open treetop like an umbrella and an in general straight stem.
The leaves are composed in groups of 5 leaflets with five pairs of those at the main petiole and
one leaflet at the tip of the petiole.

At the leaflets we have oval foliar laminae, organized as alternating tripinades, which add up to a
total length of the 30 to 70 cm.

The flowers are bi sexual with white petals, yellow stamen slightly perfumed, fruits as trilobal
capsules hanging down with length of 20 to 40 cm.
Per fruit there are some 12 to 25 seeds. Seeds are round with dark brown color and three whitish
wings.
Per adult tree some 15000 to 25000 seeds can be produced per year.

The green leaves, stalks and stems contain a high percentage of proteins, sugars and starch as well
the fruits and flowers contain high amounts of Vitamin A, B and C. The seeds contain up to 30 to
42 % of oil and the press cake has up to 60 % protein.

The nutritional value of Moringa is due to the balanced protein/ sugar content, the high content of
different carrotenoids and vitamins and his very high productivity per area.

Nutritional characterization of Moringa:

There have been made in vivo and in vitro analyses of Moringa. The levels of anti-nutritional
factors like tannins and saponins are minimal, there where no trypsin and lectin inhibitors
present.

The dry matter contains some 10% digestible sugars and some 8% starch , the metabolize able
energy in the leaves is 9.5 Mj/ kg dry matter.

Table 1. Bromatological analysis of leaves and stems of Moringa oleifera:

Dry Crude Digestibility FDA FDN PC-FDA PC-FDN

matter protein % % % % %
% %
leaves 21 23 79 27 30 4 7
stems 15 9 57 55 64 2 3

FDA: acid detergent fiber,;FDN: cell walls; PC-FDA: protein linked to the acid detergent fibers in relation to the total crude protein; PC-FDN: protein
linked to the cell walls in relation to the total crude protein.

The relation between leave fraction and stem fraction is 40 to 45% leaves and rest stem in
dependence of fertilization and age of the re-growth.

Counting the fractions, the total usable fiber content for paper pulp is limited to the non cell wall
fiber which in leaves is 27% and in Stems is 57%. If we grow the plants longer then 33 days the
total fiber content will rise but the lignin content too.
If we suppose a 10 cut per year yield of 100 tons of dry matter and we have 40 % leaves then the
leave fraction would be 40 tons of which 27% is true fiber or 10.8 tons fibers and the stems and
branches bring 60% of the total weight or 60 tons with 57% true fiber then we will get 34.2 tons
of true fiber from the stems; overall this would be 45 Tons of true fiber. If we calculate at 100 tons
an average content of the raw biomass of 17% dry matter we would have some 588,25 Tons of
fresh matter and from this fresh matter the true wet fiber content would be 264,7 tons. If we
 would add the cell wall fiber too, we would add up to over 300 tons of fiber in fresh matter or over
50 tons of fiber in dry matter.

Table 2. The productivity of Moringa in high-density plantings is evaluated at

the following densities:

Density Fresh matter Dry matter Total protein Plant losses %

Plants / ha ton/ha and ton/ha and ton/ ha and per cut
year year year
10 cuts/year 10 cuts /year 10 cuts /year 1 cut

95.000 196 30.4 5.32 0

350.000 297 53.46 9.36 0
900.000 526 94.68 16.57 0
1.000.000 780 140.4 24.57 1-2
4.000.000 9741 175.31 30.681 20
16.000.000 25901 466.21 81.581 30

1 Interpolated after the first cut without calculating the plant losses

The seeding can be done using rooted clones, cuttings, or seeds. As only the seeding with seed can
be fully mechanized, this is the preferred method although rooted clone or cuttings could offer a
better high performance selection.

The higher densities in soil show increased plant losses due to nutrients and water competition,
as well mutual overshadowing but shows as well that densities could be increased further if
growth conditions are accordingly. So in high-density aero-ponics or aqua-ponics, growing with
continuous nutrient control and high density light from various angles, higher plant density with
accordingly higher productivity could be achieved.
There should be as well some investigation done to evaluate the pharmaceutical or medicinal
value of the roots because in high-density 4-year rotation in aeroponics or aquaponics as well the
root fraction can be harvested at 100% without losses and might improve further the overall
economics.

Seeding and harvest as an agronomic procedure:

Soil preparation:

Soil should be sandy-loamy where the loam is a montmorillinite or a smectite with a ph around
6.2 to 7.5.
The ratio of the 4 main cat-ions should be 65 to 80% Calcium, 12 to 20 % Magnesium, 7%
Potassium and 1.5 to 2 % Sodium. The soil has to be well drained and crumbly for good aeration.
Content of organic matter is best from 4.5 to 8 %. The basic micronutrient and trace element
content should be analyzed and accordingly corrected if needed.

Deep plowing or sub soiling is the first step. After that one crosswise pass with a roto-cultivator to
break bigger chunks of soil in the depth of 18 to 20 cm without causing a hardpan.

Fertilization and soil improvement:

The best practice to improve soil quality would be to use finely milled biochar pre-oxidized and
enriched with micro-nutrients and trace elements as a layer below the seed line during seeding.
In a range of 300 to 500 kg per ha this would increase nutrient availability, CEC of the soil below
the seeds and add the needed micro-nutrients and trace elements to maintain the rapid growth of
moringa.

Seeding and growing:

After this a single seed-seeding machine should be adapted to the size of the seeds and the
distance of 10 cm between rows and seeds. (Wheat sawing machines) and the seeds should be
laid down at a depth of 3 times the seed diameter and then covered with soil and pressed with
roller pressing so there are no air pockets around the seeds.
During growth the main pest in the tropics is the leave cutter ant and Lepidoptera. Both can easily
be handled with adequate insecticides

Irrigation:

Then switch on the irrigation system to make sure that the seeds can germinate. Yearly evenly
distributed rain quantity is between 850 to 1200 mm. (Depending on evo-transpiration and
average temperature and humidity) For irrigation you can use drip irrigation, sprinkler or micro
sprinkler.

Harvest and processing:

A row independent harvester that cuts and chops the green mass into a size of 5 to 8 cm and
directly loads it into a trailer. The trailers are used to transport an unload the freshly harvested
and chopped Moringa into the reception bin of a desintegrator ( hammer mill, ultraturax, rotating
knife mill etc.)

Cost structure for seeding to harvest:

Seeds 2 to 5 US$/ kg if bought, 0.8-1 US$/ if produced in own seed production.

Own seed production gives you a certain guarantee about the quality of the provenance and the
germination percentage (Seeds passing boarders are often fumigated and inadequately stored and
handled and therefore loose big percentage of their germinating power).

I take machine cost I was used in Bolivia as a calculation basis.

Sub-soiling per ha 25 US$
Roto-cultivator 2 passes per ha 35 US$
Application of fertilizer together with seeding 38 US$
Insecticide application per pass 18US$ 3 passes per ha/year 54 US$
Application of Dolomite / Calcium carbonate 18 US$
Cost of Dolomite 15US$/ton 7.5 US$
Manual weeding per pass 15 US$, 6 passes per year 90 US$
Fertilizer 90 kg NPK + molasses 14 US$ 20 US$
3 liter micro nutrient and trace element concentrates 5US$/liter 15 US$
Insecticides 5 liter concentrate 15 US$/liter 75 US$
Irrigation hardware 850 US$
Pumping and irrigation labor 250 US$
Harvest and transport to processing 65 US$
Total 1542.5 US$

As these are net cost from a big farm operation (15.000 ha, 3 crops per year) and with own
machinery and a much better capacity usage then in a small 50 ha operation the cost have to be
re-checked and corrected based on locally rented machinery and energy prices.
As well regarding fertilizer, Dolomite/ calcium carbonate, molasses and insecticide, costs have to
be corrected according to the prices at the local market and according to the fact that in 50 ha
these are small quantities and not bulk price quantities.

At an expected conservative productivity instead of 140 tons dry matter only 80 tons dry matter
per ha and year we come up with cost per ton of 20 US$/ton or
0.02 US$/ kg of dry matter. The processing costs still have to be calculated under the prerequisite
that size and throughput as well availability of secondhand industrial machinery is not known at
the moment.