‹ Part 1 – The future is non-toxic

We have seen in the last segment of this series: Jatropha has a future which will be non-toxic. I pointed out that high yielding planting material will become available rather sooner than later to make JcL ready for commercial success as a feedstock for high revenue energy products and animal feed. But with the right planting material available, what will the ideal farm look like when we get there?

Looking for the proper farming concepts we should first understand that JcL is a tree crop (or rather a bush or shrub). Traditionally it was planted in hedges which primarily had a living fence function to separate cattle from farmed fields. Obviously Jatropha was doing well in such a planting pattern where mono cropping is not an issue which in JcL brings along problems like heavy pest attacks and scarcity of water and nutrients. Therefore the good old hedges planted alongside roads and fields with superior modern planting material can become a great way for the traditional small African farmer to make himself some extra income while fully sticking to his original farming practices.

But, as a completely different playing field we also have to look deeper into large scale commercial farming. At Bionic Palm we have run an extensive Jatropha test farming project on more than 100 ha for many years to study the best agronomic methods. Very early we understood that true sustainability can never be accomplished with a mono cropping system. Thus, over a series of intermediary steps, we arrived at our optimal solution: double alleys with a minimum of 10 m in between for permanent intercropping with the most convenient annual crops.

The double alley approach has numerous advantages especially in semi arid climates. The hedges offer protection from soil erosion through wind and rain. They can also improve soil quality in many ways operating as a nutrient pump from deeper levels, adding carbon to the soil by shedding their leaves and by supporting and maintaining microorganisms added to the soil like mycorrhiza.

If irrigation is part of the farming strategy permanent piping can be installed in between the double hedges giving them good protection.

While many annual crops (maize, soy, beans, ground nut just to name a few) can be planted together with JcL hedges we actually prefer high value vegetable crops in combination with a no-till system, be it glyphosate (round-up) or cover crop based. Only these crops really bring the enormous profitability potential of an agroforestry concept built on non-toxic JcL backbones into reality.

Adding a comprehensive soil development and management concept utilizing biochar and organic fertilizer can help turning very difficult environmental conditions like in former mining areas around.

‹ Overview                                                                                                                                    Part 1 – The future is non-toxic ›

I meet all these people lately asking me, hey, “what are you doing down there in Africa…” and I say: “Jatropha farming my friend” trying to be as brief as possible. 95% of the time I either get a blank look or a “Huu Jat… eh… what did you say? Never heard of it.” Hard to believe for someone who has spent every day of his live since 2008 with the ups and downs of this business but the plain truth is, most people don’t have the slightest idea what I am talking about… So usually quite hesitantly I start going on: “You know, its this new crop people talk about a lot recently for producing non-edible oil to be used in airplanes replacing some of today’s fossil jet fuels and get the airlines’ carbon balance right”. Ahh, they say, “like Palm Oil isn’t it? But isn’t that bad for the environment?”

Listening to this again and again and reading all those vastly unfounded reports from NGO’s bashing a very promising future energy and animal feed crop that has not even fully emerged the “breeder’s drawing board” yet has finally convinced me to start writing this small series of articles. It should help those interested and with an open mind to understand better what the whole thing is about. There is an obvious high disappointment with Jatropha by many investors and downstream oil users, however, this is a feeling commonly not shared by long standing experienced researchers of the plant. Now, why is that so?

Jatropha (to be precise “Jatropha curcas Linn” or for us from here on simply JcL) is a native species of Central America and a member of a large genus with more than 170 different species. It offers a lot of interesting features as a biological system that have never been fully explored.  JcL was brought to Africa and Asia many hundred years ago by the Portuguese. Until recently its use was mainly limited to serving as hedges separating cattle from fields and controlling mosquitoes with a small side use for soap and candle making. Therefore, there was never any serious domestication of the plant and for many decades it was basically left to itself until it was rediscovered in Africa and India as a possible feedstock source for biodiesel. The big hype that followed with investors was never founded on well thought through agronomic and business plans and definitely not based on a sound scientific understanding of JcL specifically or its taxonomic genus in general. Only a small number of reports had been published on the plant and only a handful of scientists had ever studied it. (A situation that significantly changed over the last 5 years.)

Still the investors of the early years concentrated on the acquisition of hundreds of thousands of hectars and started planting rapidly without ever truly analyzing the material they were working with. The back lash came quickly: The near wild planting material they chose to use with enormous financial efforts did not perform anywhere near as expected in their presentations. They all left out a very simple rule of agricultural projects: testing, testing, testing… When they started realizing their mistakes it was already too late. The investors’ money was gone and projects failing everywhere as they were never planned right in the first place. And then the global financial crisis hit, so no fresh money was available anywhere. Today we find large numbers of suspended or even completely abandoned projects from those days especially all over Africa.

It didn’t take long and legions of would be experts started blaming and criticizing JcL as the wrong approach for an endless number of reasons. However, since the people writing all the negative reports are not remotely the same kind of experts on JcL as they are on negative report writing, very few sound, business oriented assessments surfaced over the recent years. But mostly unrecognized in public, in the background there was some profound practical and scientific work starting. While industry, finance and politics started abandoning JcL everywhere many researchers and agronomists picked up the subject and started for the first time some serious work on that crop.

This author made some simple statements in a presentation given at a conference in 2008 in Accra:

“The Jatropha value chain is financially not working out for the early producers”.

But, the statement continues: “the outlook is positive once the following conditions are met:

1 – high yielding domesticated cultivars become available

2 – improved agronomic methods increase yields

3 – JcL specific mechanization technology becomes available”

Today I would add a statement about non-toxic cultivars or (less preferable) successful detoxification of the press cake in order to be able to use it as animal feed.

It was all clear in 2008 (while most still presented their old business models). More an more scientific reports stated: we need better planting material to begin with! However, improving planting material by large margins has been done again and again, so why not with JcL? Its quite impressive to study the history of the development of some common crops like maize with yield improvements of several hundred percent over the last 50-100 years.

In spite of the permanent flow of critical reporting, new strategies have been put in place around the world to change the JcL picture regarding all of the above mentioned points. For example a company called SG Biofuels from San Diego, California has launched its Jatropha 2.0 platform with a lot of marketing hype (premature as I think) while we at Bionic Palm started our Bionic JcL3.0 initiative focused on Africa but actually reaching ahead much further than SGB. What all these activities have in common is a more profound approach to overcome the barriers that stopped the early JcL growers. So what is out there to be expected?

I predict a thriving JcL industry picking up from 2015 with some early adopters of a generation 3 approach. Improved cultivars start coming up and will do so in growing numbers over the remainder of the decade. The markets, especially those for green jet fuel (SPK) sector, will push hard for more supply, as their demand will be rising seriously from 2012 when Europe introduces its new emission policy for all commercial airlines flying in and out of Europe.

 

Part 1 – The future is non-toxic ›

I meet all these people lately asking me, hey, “what are you doing down there in Africa…” and I say: “Jatropha farming my friend” trying to be as brief as possible. 95% of the time I either get a blank look or a “Huu Jat… eh… what did you say? Never heard of it.”

This is hard to believe for somebody who has spent every day of his live since 2008 with the ups and downs of this business but its the plain truth, most people don’t have the slightest idea what I am talking about… So usually quite hesitantly I start going on: “You know, its this new crop people talk about a lot recently for producing non-edible oil to be used in airplanes replacing some of today’s fossil jet fuels and get the airlines’ carbon balance right”. Ahh, they say, “like palm oil isn’t it? But isn’t that bad for the environment?”

Listening to this again and again and reading all those vastly unfounded reports from NGO’s bashing a very promising future energy and animal feed crop that has not even fully emerged the “breeder’s drawing board” yet has finally convinced me to start writing this small series of articles. It should help those interested and with an open mind to understand better what the whole thing is about.

I myself am the MD of Bionic Palm in Ghana and a Jatropha farmer, but even more an active breeder of future high yielding Jatropha and a developer of all kinds of “agronomic” techniques aiming to make this plant a profitable and highly sustainable source of energy and protein. We work with partners from around the world who share our motivation.

There is an obvious high disappointment by many with Jatropha by many investors and downstream oil users, however, this is a notion commonly not shared by long standing experienced researchers of the plant. Now, why is that so?

Jatropha (to be correct “Jatropha curcas Linn” or for us from here on simply JcL) is a native of Central America and a member of a large genus of approx. 172 different species. It offers a lot of interesting features as a biological system that have never been fully explored.  JcL was brought to Africa and Asia many hundred years ago by the Portuguese. Until recently its use was mainly limited to serving as hedges separating cattle from fields and controlling mosquitoes with a small side use for soap and candle making. Therefore, there was never any serious domestication of the plant and for many decades it was basically left to itself until it was rediscovered in Africa and India as a possible feedstock source for biodiesel. The big hype that followed with investors was never founded on well thought through agronomic and business plans and definitely not based on a sound scientific understanding of JcL specifically or its taxonomic genus in general. Only a small number of reports had been published on the plant and only a handful of scientists had ever studied it. (A situation that significantly changed over the last 5 years.)

Still the investors of the early years concentrated on the acquisition of hundreds of thousands of hectars and started planting rapidly without ever truly analyzing the material they were working with. The back lash came quickly: The near wild plants they chose to plant with enormous financial efforts did not perform anywhere near as expected in their presentations. They all left out a very simple rule of agricultural projects: testing, testing, testing… When they started realizing their mistakes it was already too late. The investors’ money was gone and projects failing everywhere as they were never planned right in the first place. And then the global financial crisis hit, so no fresh money was available anywhere. Today we find large numbers of suspended or even completely abandoned projects from those days especially all over Africa.

It didn’t take long and legions of would be experts started blaming and criticizing JcL as the wrong approach for an endless number of reasons. However, since the people writing all the negative reports are not remotely the same kind of experts on JcL as they are on negative report writing, very few sound, business oriented assessments surfaced over the last few years. We have recently reported about one here.

But mostly unrecognized in public, in the background there was some profound practical and scientific work starting. While industry, finance and politics started abandoning JcL everywhere many researchers and agronomists picked up the subject and started for the first time some serious work on tha5t crop.

This author made some simple statements in a presentation given at a conference in 2008 in Accra:

(Here you can find a later, refined version of this very presentation)

“The Jatropha value chain is financially not working out for the early producers”.

But, the statement continues: “the outlook is positive once the following conditions are met:

1 – high yielding domesticated cultivars become available

2 – improved agronomic methods increase yields

3 – JcL specific mechanization technology becomes available”

Today I would add a statement about non-toxic cultivars or (less preferable) successful detoxification of the press cake in order to be able to use it as animal feed.

It was all clear in 2008 (while most still presented their old business models and some even do it until today), what is stated in more an more scientific reports: we need better planting material to begin with! However, improving planting material by large margins has been done again and again, so why not with JcL? Its quite impressive to study the history of the development of some common crops like maize with yield improvements of several hundred percent over the last 50-100 years.

In spite of the permanent flow of critical reporting, new strategies have been put in place around the world to change the JcL picture regarding all of the above mentioned points.

For example a company called SG Biofuels from San Diego, California has launched its Jatropha 2.0 platform with a lot of marketing hype (prematurely as I think) while we at Bionic Palm started our Bionic JcL3.0 initiative focused on Africa but actually reaching out much further than SGB. What all these activities have in common is a more profound approach to overcome the barriers that stopped the early JcL growers.

So what is out there to be expected?

My prediction is for a thriving JcL industry starting to pick up around 2015 with some early adopters of a generation 3 approach. Improved cultivars start coming up and will do so in growing numbers over the next couple of years. We plan to have a first high yielding non-toxic cultivar available for extensive testing by the end of 2013 after finalizing a proof of concept by mid 2012.

The markets, especially for green jet fuel (SPK) sector, will push hard for more supply, as their demand will be rising seriously from 2012 when Europe introduces its new emission policy for all commercial airlines flying in and out of Europe. Therefore the interested industry is already returning to JcL working on all kinds of feasibility reports and finance will start following them as long term off-take agreements become common.

Unfortunately we are currently going through a phase which I call the Jatropha generation 2, where strange people are pushing around clouds, sign long term deals for non existent Jatropha oil and “buy and sell” on the web a commodity that mostly doesn’t exist. This is the aftermath of the generation 1 gold rush and will vanish as soon as serious generation 3 projects emerge, based on strategies incorporating sound planting materials and agronomy concepts.

This article is followed by 4 more attempting to give more insight about what is to be expected from JcL:

Jatropha for Dummies – Part 1 – The future is non-toxic

Jatropha for Dummies – Part 2 – The Farming

Jatropha for Dummies – Part 3 – Equipment and Processing

Jatropha for Dummies – Part 4 – JcL Break Through – But When?

 

You always wanted to know – But nobody told you…

Bionic Palm Jatropha breeders have decided to create a small series of articles to give the interested novice to the field of Jatropha a quick, but complete insight to what is really happening around this often so very falsely judged crop. Many articles and documents can be found on the web, some are extremely positive, but many utterly negative. Most of those articles have been written by authors who have an agenda of their own (that’s all we are going to say about the usual bunch of NGO’s) and are usually not very familiar with the subject of Jatropha itself. And not really interested to research and learn…

Therefore writers keep copying incorrect information without end from always the same incorrect sources on the web spreading the same nonsense again and again. A vicious cycle… Nobody seems to feel its necessary to verify information anymore when publishing online.

A good one of the many examples is: “Jatropha is invasive and therefore banned in many countries”. That information is outright wrong, but repeated again and again. The truth: Jatropha gossypiifolia is the invasive species (and it really is!) banned at least in the NSW province of Australia. However, what we commonly call “Jatropha” and develop as an energy and animal feed crop is Jatropha curcas Linn! A distinctly different species within the genus Jatropha which consists of more than 170 different species…

At Bionic Palm here in Ghana we have farmed and developed Jatropha since 2007 and are probably the global leader in non-toxic hybrid development. We are with our crop each and every day, 365 days a year. This seems unique amongst the breeding companies today who want to direct the development of a tropical plant from plush offices and genetic labs in cities like San Diego, Singapore and the Netherlands while their breeding orchards are thousands of miles away.  They stop breeding for weekends and holidays, which often means they have to wait months for the same consecutive flowering to occur again which they missed last Saturday morning while shopping with the kids at the mall.

We want to give people a chance to understand Jatropha the way we do, but at the same time deliver it simple enough for those who are looking for correct information, while not intending to become Jatropha experts. And we promise to remain as unbiased as possible…

Let’s get going, here are the links to the articles currently available:

Jatropha for Dummies – Part 0 – The Problem

Jatropha for Dummies – Part 1 – The future is non-toxic

Jatropha for Dummies – Part 2 – The Farming

‹ Part 0 – The Problem                                                                                                                              Part 2 – The Farming  ›         

After lots of painful experience during the first generation of commercial Jatropha projects – attempting to exploit the toxic plants potential for biodiesel – many are skeptical regarding a possible success for this cop. Still, groups of professional plant developers have formed worldwide working to convert the wild species Jatropha curcas into a viable commercial energy crop. Combined with an ever increasing flow of scientific reports exploring all aspects of this promising species it can be seen by now: success will only be a matter of time.

While contemporary reports on Jatropha development usually keep staring at incumbent  farming projects which are still struggling with all the typical generation 1 problems, be it planting material or agronomic practices, Jatropha has long shown its enormous potential in all aspects of planting material improvement. The results are clearly visible in the breeding orchards around the world and in many insider reports.

The future of Jatropha is non-toxic, which will make it one of the most profitable crops for farmers ever planted. After pressing the oil from the seeds the remaining seed cake will be a highly valuable raw material for animal feed mixes exceeding even the protein content of soy meal. Jatropha seed meal was falsely considered inevitably toxic and difficult to detoxify. The solution to the problem is the creating of non-toxic cultivars based on wild accessions from the center of origin as parental material. Here at Bionic Palm we are among the world leaders in this sector of plant development…

Protein rich feed materials are in high demand around the world and increasingly expensive. Therefore non-toxic Jatropha is not only breaking the profitability barrier for Jatropha farming projects but also reversing the feed price squeeze in many tropical regions thus allowing poultry rearing and aquaculture to become good SME businesses ounce again.

There is a wide genetic diversity in Jatropha germplasm formerly unexploited which can be found at the center of origin. This allows successful breeding for improved planting material including the introduction of the non-toxic trait. Interspecific hybridization offers a second route to an increased genetic spread for selection of superior traits. Bionic Palm has been using both aspects systematically from the very beginning of the Jatropha Breeder 3.0 program.

Jatropha is ideal in support of advanced agroforestry concepts helping to reclaim depleted soil formerly used for mining and unsustainable farming. With a growing environmental awareness in developing countries requirements are increasing for mining operations to reduce their environmental impact including carbon emissions. Non-toxic Jatropha offers enormous possibilities to convert growing sustainability budgets from simple cost items into effective investments as mining operations are usually also large energy consumers.

Jatropha can play a major role in adaptation to the effects of climate change in the tropical and sub-tropical regions. Advanced Jatropha cultivars will exhibit an increased drought tolerance and offer capabilities to withstand the expected climatic changes in the tropics. Jatropha hedges planted in combination with food crops under irrigation will help protect the latter from the increasingly harsh environmental situation.

Fruit cluster on a non-toxic breeding plant (Bionic orchard, Ghana)

After lots of painful experience during the first generation of commercial Jatropha projects – attempting to exploit the toxic plants potential for biodiesel – many are skeptical regarding a possible success for this cop. Still, groups of professional plant developers have formed worldwide working to convert the wild species Jatropha curcas into a viable commercial energy crop. Combined with an ever increasing flow of scientific reports exploring all aspects of this promising species it can be seen by now: success will only be a matter of time.

 

While contemporary reports on Jatropha development usually keep staring at incumbent  farming projects which are still struggling with all the typical generation 1 problems, be it planting material or agronomic practices, Jatropha has long shown its enormous potential in all aspects of planting material improvement. The results are clearly visible in the breeding orchards around the world and in many insider reports.

 

The future of Jatropha is non-toxic, which will make it one of the most profitable crops for farmers ever planted. After pressing the oil from the seeds the remaining seed cake will be a highly valuable raw material for animal feed mixes exceeding even the protein content of soy meal. Jatropha seed meal was falsely considered inevitably toxic and difficult to detoxify. The solution to the problem is the creating of non-toxic cultivars based on wild accessions from the center of origin as parental material. Here at Bionic Palm we are among the world leaders in this sector of plant development…

 

Protein rich feed materials are in high demand around the world and increasingly expensive. Therefore non-toxic Jatropha is not only breaking the profitability barrier for Jatropha farming projects but also reversing the feed price squeeze in many tropical regions thus allowing poultry rearing and aquaculture to become good SME businesses ounce again.

 

There is a wide genetic diversity in Jatropha germplasm formerly unexploited which can be found at the center of origin. This allows successful breeding for improved planting material including the introduction of the non-toxic trait. Interspecific hybridization offers a second route to an increased genetic spread for selection of superior traits. Bionic Palm has been using both aspects systematically from the very beginning of the Jatropha Breeder 3.0 program.

 

Jatropha is ideal in support of advanced agroforestry concepts helping to reclaim depleted soil formerly used for mining and unsustainable farming. With a growing environmental awareness in developing countries requirements are increasing for mining operations to reduce their environmental impact including carbon emissions. Non-toxic Jatropha offers enormous possibilities to convert growing sustainability budgets from simple cost items into effective investments as mining operations are usually also large energy consumers.

 

Alleys of pruned Jatropha prepared for vegetable planting (Bionic test farm, Ghana)

Jatropha can play a major role in adaptation to the effects of climate change in the tropical and sub-tropical regions. Advanced Jatropha cultivars will exhibit an increased drought tolerance and offer capabilities to withstand the expected climatic changes in the tropics. Jatropha hedges planted in combination with food crops under irrigation will help protect the latter from the increasingly harsh environmental situation.