Melia Plantations: establishment of a Melia dubia Plantation

Abstract of the presentation of

Kuluni Millaniyage

One of the major problems in today's agriculture and forestry sector is reducing income year by year. The land values are increased and income from plantation management is reduced due to increased cost for labour, increase in cost of cultivation and increase in transportation cost. Because of that owners are selling land and looking for other business. Therefore we need to think of obtaining good income from forestry by reducing labors and increasing yield. In today's picture, the middle men are earning a good income from timber products, and the planter who produces gets less from what he produced. Since many short term crops need more labor, transportation and inventory cost, the final gain for the planters are very low. To make good revenues per hectare, we need to cultivate medium to long term crops keeping the cost to minimal.

Melia Dubia is one of the fast growing trees in the world and gives good returns. It can be used in match or biomass or plywood industries. After 3 years, 30-40 tons of biomass per acre can be harvested up to 10 years. The price of wood per cubic meter is SLR 9,900 and therefore one can get minimum revenue of Rs 1,033,200 per every hectare.

When establishing a plantation, the major importance is to decide on the best area to grow the plants. Since this species is growing well in the wet and intermediate zone, Mathugama area was selected as the destination.

Ginger which is a gold mining business itself is intercropped to utilize the land area. Ginger can be harvested within 10 months while the Melia plants will be harvested after 14 years.

Pruning and thinning is given a great importance as well as supplying the timber to plywood companies. As the conclusion, this plant can be recommended as a profitable tree with a good potential for the future timber market.