Traditional Technology Solutions

Presents

Organic Farming Methods

- Groundnut cultivation

Presented by,

N. S. Santhana Krishnan,

Traditional Technology Solutions,

E-mail: sankrish@tts.org.in,

Website: www.tts.org.in .

Groundnut cultivation In this presentation we are going to discuss about cultivation of

groundnut and its oil extraction. We have cultivated groundnut in a land which was not in use for

more than 12 years(chemical traces was almost nil). We started the cultivation at the starting of winter season

simultaneously with black gram and sesame. This cultivation took place in our lands situated in the Village

named “Neyyadupakkam”. We chose 50 cents for groundnut cultivation. We did irrigation for plant twice and third irrigation for

plucking(harvesting) groundnut. We added quarter ton of composted cow dung and 5 packets of

Rhizobium bacteria (to improve groundnut formation at root nodes)provided by state government for groundnut cultivation.

Initially we made the land wet and puddle the soil trice to make it

powder and soft

Two Ox driven ploughs were used to make ridges and furrows in

the puddled land

When the seeds were sown in furrows the adjacent ridge was made to

furrow i.e. The ridge soil got shifted to seeded furrow and buries the

seeds under soil.

We did first irrigation after twenty days of seeding

Plants grown after forty days

Plants grown after sixty days

Plants started maturing after 80 days

Partially matured groundnut by eighty days

Fully matured groundnut by 100 days

Unshelled groundnut after post harvest drying (clay sticking on shells).

After cleaning the de-Sheller machine we de-shelled the groundnuts

De-shelled groundnuts were manually cleaned for small nut

which are not de-shelled and also for clay balls.

Groundnuts were cold pressed (Temperature < 40◦C) using wooden

expeller.

We used purified and RO, UV treated water to facilitate oil extraction

to minimize bacterial infestation and increase its shelf life.

After pressing groundnuts we got oil with suspended water and peanut

particles which were allowed to precipitate by keeping it un-disturbed for

three days. The oil standing above the precipitate was clear and got

collected in a cleaned nylon can for storage.

The by-product of oil extraction is the oil-cake. It is an excellent

fertilizer(high in nitrogen) and also a good cattle fodder.

Manually we removed the shell by beating and cleaning

conclusion:

• We harvested groundnuts in volume of 3.5 gunny bags(85 kg

rice bags) from 50 cents of land organically.

• We got comparatively good yield we are planning to increase

the cultivation area next season.

• The plants were healthy and least attacked by diseases and

pests since they had good immune system and good resistance

to pest. We fenced the land completely with branches of thorny

bushes and reduced cattle entry.

• We came to know that groundnut shouldn’t be cultivated

continuously in same land, so we have started to cultivate

green gram in that place few days after plucking of

groundnuts. We shall discuss about it in upcoming ppt’s.

Thank You