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Help me with a new organic farm project!

vgabrov
11 years ago

Help me with a new organic farm project!

Partners and I are thinking about starting a farm to grow, use and sell fresh organic vegetables, fruits, herbs, nuts (hoping to use biointensive or other effective natural methods of agriculture).

I want to know your opinion and advice on: what we could grow on land this big, what would be the general ideas for a biointensive farm here, what should we start with, is it worth it in this climate/region/time to start an organic farm? What sizes/quantities of crops should we expect and prepare for on 5 hectares? We will of course still have to build relationships with the biggest retails stores, local clients, exporters, which ones are more important on the first stage? Also, please just write whatever you think is important.

I'll try to give you all information I can at the moment, and I will also answer all following questions from you.

We are located in Eastern Bulgaria, between cities of Varna and Burgas.

Climate is Mediterranean and continental (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geography_of_Bulgaria#Climate)

We are offered 5 hectares of agriculture land with the following promised:

1 km from our "office" in downtown

the only land chunk this big and this close to use

suitable for organic farm (i.e. synthetic pesticides and herbicides were not used here for at least 20 years, we'll have to test the soil, of course)

electrical line is there (as you can see on the photos)

small river passes just behind this piece of land (so irrigation can also be taken care of)

The whole 5ha are currently leased to a company which grows wheat on one half and corn on the other half.

Today, when these photos were taken, it was +30C. There is not much rain throughout summer. However, agriculture is the main business for a lot of folks in Bulgaria (the other big areas being real estate and tourism, probably). The land in Bulgaria is very fruitful, and many professionals say that the climate is more suitable for vegetables and fruit production than in neighboring Greece and Turkey, which are nonetheless more successful in exporting their crops.

Here are the photos of the 5ha:

http://www.flickr.com//photos/readme123456/sets/72157630219734304/show/

Here's a video tour around:

http://youtu.be/VoHFWraTrko

Thank you so much for attention to my questions. I hope I can give you more details to clarify what we're working on.

Vladimir