By Joseph Mugenyi
Kibiito: A pumpkin is a cultivar of a squash plant, most commonly of Cucurbita pepo, that is round with smooth, slightly ribbed skin, and most often deep yellow to orange in coloration.
Pumpkins are widely grown for commercial use and are used both for food and recreation. They are some of farmers’ favourite seasonal crops.
This is because pumpkins have a long shelf life of almost six months.
In that, even when the farmer harvests when the market is not good, they can wait till the prices in the market are fair.
Pumpkins are very versatile in their uses for cooking. Most parts of the pumpkin are edible, including the fleshy shell, the seeds, the leaves, and even the flowers.
Second, there are products made from pumpkins like animal feeds which also work as natural dewomers to animals and poultry.
How To Grow Pumpkins
Pumpkins grow well in loamy soils with good drainage and high humus percentage.
In uganda, there are different types of pumpkins grown ranging from shapes, size and color.
Common types include sweetcream, Bala, Dulu, Onziga, Sunfish, sugar pie and Anderina.
Pumpkins are planted direct in soils. i.e they don’t need a necessary bed. Harvesting is between 90 to 120 days.
After preparing land well, do a spacing of 12ft*12ft though others prefer 10ft*10ft. But we believe with 12ft spacing, one gets bigger fruits.
Dig holes 2ft wide, 2ft deep and sow 5 seeds which you later prune after germinating
Below is an estimated input and income from an acre of a pumpkin garden atmost calculations;
Spacing – 12ft*12ft
Holes per acre – 350 holes.
Each hole – 5 seeds.
Prune to 3 plants after germination.
Each plant produces a minimum 15 pumpkins thus 15*3=45 pumpkins per hole
I.e. 45*350=15,750 pumpkins per acer.
Expenses
Permanent labour Shs150,000*4 = Shs 600,000 which involves Clearing and land preparing Shs250,000 (estimation) plus Digging holes 1000*350 = Shs350,000.
Fertilizers and pesticides Shs400,000.
Seeds Shs50,000
Total expense Shs1,650,000.
Because we are calculating atleast in production. We are only taking 15,000 fruits instead of 15,750 fruits.
This means our production price for each pumpkin is Shs1,650,000÷15,000 pumpkins = Shs110 per head of pumpkin.
Setting the least price for farm gate assuming Shs1,000 per pumpkin at farm.
It means Shs1,000-Shs110=Shs890 profit per head.
Therefore Shs890 *15,000 pumpkins = Shs13,350,000.
NB: All Above Is Possible With Good Management.
Get all the agricultural information here bi-weekly. Mugenyi Joseph (MJ Farmer) is a practicing Agribusiness entrepreneur based in Kibiito and a software engineering student at Makerere University. He can be reached on +256701-443309, Email: mugenyijosemj@gmail.com
