ENTREPRENEURS COMMERCIALISE PLANTING MAMAN, TO DRIVE LOCAL AGRO SECTOR

JEMPOL, March 25 (Bernama) -- Maman, known as a traditional vegetable, is now seen as a potential commercial crop as its demand is increasing among food entrepreneurs, thus opening up opportunities for farmers to cultivate it more systematically and on a large scale.

Young entrepreneur Alif Dzulfarhan Mohamad Shaharudin, 36, is among those who have successfully taken advantage of this opportunity when he expanded the crop from a small garden to an agricultural operation covering about 10 acres so far and is able to produce hundreds of kilogrammes of the vegetable every week.

Known as Nourish Farm, the entrepreneur from Semenyih, Selangor said he started venturing into agriculture after moving to Batu Kikir in 2013 and initially operated a family ruminant food factory before focusing on the vegetable sector.

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“After the food factory was stable, I got the opportunity to work on government leased land and started growing several crops such as bananas, eggplants and short-term vegetables.

“Around 2017, I started focusing on maman crops after seeing the demand for this traditional vegetable being quite consistent, especially among local food entrepreneurs,” he told Bernama recently.

The father of two said maman crops have a short maturity period of around 23 to 25 days before they can be harvested, thus allowing production to be done in stages to ensure that supplies are always sufficient for customers.

Alif Dzulfarhan said his farm is now capable of producing about 500 kilogrammes of maman per week or at least two tonnes per month to meet customer demand including restaurants, food traders and wholesalers in the state as well as Bangi, Kajang and Shah Alam.

According to him, maman is sold at around RM6 to RM8 per kilogramme depending on the number of orders with sales revenue reaching between RM13,000 to RM15,000 per month on weekdays and increases to about RM30,000 during high demand such as festive seasons.

Meanwhile, he said the development of the farm's operations was also driven by a financing of RM125,000 from Agrobank in 2024 which enabled him to expand the planting area in addition to upgrading the farm's facilities.

"With the financing, I was able to increase the planting area from about six acres to 10 acres now in addition to buying an electric water pump and improving the farm's irrigation system.

"Previously, I used a diesel pump which cost around RM3,000 per month but after upgrading to an electric pump, the cost could be reduced to about RM300 per month," he said, adding that he employs five workers on the farm.

He said the financing also helped speed up the farm's development because without financial support, the process of expanding the planting area had to be done in stages according to one's own capital capabilities.

"If I use my own capital, it may take me a few months to open a new area, but with this financing I can expand a few more acres in a shorter period of time thus increasing production," he said, adding that he has also received assistance from the state government and the agriculture department.

Apart from maman, he also cultivates other vegetable crops such as mustard, spinach and water spinach in a rotational crop system to ensure soil fertility.

Seeing the growing potential, Alif Dzulfarhan is optimistic that maman crops can become a commercially valuable crop if cultivated more systematically with technological support and appropriate financing facilities.

He said efforts to modernize the agricultural sector, including through financing facilities such as those provided by Agrobank, can help more agro entrepreneurs increase the scale of production and make agriculture a sustainable source of income.

"In the future, I plan to produce downstream products based on maman such as maman chicken rendang, maman meat rendang and so on to diversify products as well as continue to expand the market," he said.

-- BERNAMA