‘Plant pepper’
RAMBLE, Hanover – JUST over three months ago, Orville McFarlane, 23, left the Montego Bay Community College in St James with a bachelor’s degree in environmental studies.
Believing that a well-paying job would be hard to come by despite his scholastic achievements, McFarlane decided to try his hands at growing hot peppers at the end of his one-year contract with the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), where he was employed in an aquaponics project, while attending evening classes at the Montego Bay Community College.
“I was working for a year and after I found out that my contract would be up in September, and just leaving college, I said you know what, I am not going to get a good paying work same time, so I decided to do hot peppers,” the young farmer explained.
Partnering with his brother Nicholas Shaw and their cousin Ryan Fraser, they prepared two acres of land in Ramble, owned by a family member living overseas, to cultivate peppers.
But the beginning of their journey back in March was not easy.
They were confronted with a slew of challenges, due to the limited funds to purchase seedlings, fertiliser and other materials and for labour.
Undaunted by the rocky start and determined to succeed, McFarlane sold his motor car and used the proceeds to help finance the project.
“My brother and I went to several banks and loan places to get money to do the farm, but no one wanted to give us a loan because they said it is too risky. So at the time I had a motor car so I told my brother I am going to sell the car to do the pepper. So that is how the whole thing started,” McFarlane told the Jamaica Observer West.
He recounted that they could only acquire the first batch of 17,500 seedlings in June — after making two previous orders -because the field was not ready for planting, coupled with the fact that they did not have enough money to pay for the young plants when the first two orders were ready for delivery.
“When the time came the land wasn’t fully prepared. It was just three of us doing the work and we didn’t have any money to pay anybody,” McFarlane said.
“However, the third batch we got and just planted it out. It entailed 17,500 seedlings and it is not the entire two acres. We have 32 beds left and those 32 beds will be holding a capacity of 15,000,” he said, adding, “What makes the farm unique is that two acres normally take like 10,000 or 12,000 seedlings, but we did 30,000 [seedlings] on two acres.”
Now, McFarlane and his team’s hard work and dedication have begun to bear fruit.
“Since September when we started reaping, we have so far reaped more than 13,000 pounds from the field because of the way we do it. We fertilise it and the fertiliser alone won’t work, so we had to add an acid name water conditioner that reduces the PH of the water,” the young entrepreneur explained.
He further disclosed that the cultivation of peppers is so lucrative that he intends to make it his full-time job.
“Right now it is the best business. I would encourage anyone to get into it. Anyone who don’t have a job or they think their job is not paying them well, plant pepper,” he said.
McFarlane, who recently started a nursery of his own, now has his sights set on more than doubling production and hiring more labourers on his farm.
“The next couple of weeks we planning to do another 35,000 to 40,000 plants. The entire plot of land is five acres, so what we are planning to do is to plant the entire five acres into peppers. By then I will employ 25 to 30 people,” he said.
The young farmer, who currently employs six persons, including five females on the farm, said that males are reluctant to work in the field.
“It is very difficult to get persons to work on the farm because the young guys that coming up they don’t want to do the work and if I do get one they complain about the sun. What I do is I try to get the females. When I get the females they are more willing to do the work, so I work with the females. Right now we have five females with us and we employ one male,” he said.
The young farmer now sells his produce to several businesses in Westmoreland, but plans to market it across the island as soon as production increases.