How this Maharashtra farmer earns Rs8 lakh per acre from organic date farming

When Jagdish Shendge and his father Damodar Shendge first saw date plants in a nearby sugar factory, the duo thought they were ornamental. Barhi date plants are imported into India from Iran and it is no surprise that the father-son duo were unaware of this exotic fruit, which is eaten fresh and is rapidly gaining market here.

“When those trees started yielding fruits, I realised that this crop was more profitable than mosambi (sweet lime) and sugarcane we had been growing on our 10-acre farm for many years,” says Jagdish.

His Tanwadi village in Ghansawangi taluka lies in the drought-prone Jalna district of Maharashtra. “We decided to experiment with Barhi (or Barhee) variety date on three out of ten acres as they do not require much water and fetch good rates in the market,” says Jagdish, who sells the fruits at Rs200 per kg from a stall on his farm. 

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Yellow-coloured Barhi date has a sweet and creamy taste. It is eaten fresh and is rich in fibre and antioxidants.

Buying and planting saplings

In 2020, Jagdish procured 180 date plants from a nursery in Gujarat which imports them from Iran. “These plants are developed using tissue culture and yield fruit in the fourth year. Plants prepared using offshoots yield fruits only after seven to eight years, making them less profitable,” explains Jagdish, who works with his father on the farm. 

He paid Rs4,000 per plant (Rs7.2 lakh for 180 plants). Each plant was around eight to ten months old. 

“The total investment for 3 acres was Rs9 lakh including the money spent on preparing the land by adding cow dung and digging pits for plants,” he points out.

He planted 180 plants over three acres with a plant-to-plant gap of 25ft x 25ft. “If the soil is soft, a pit of 2ft X 2ft is enough. But in rocky soil, a pit of 3ft X 3ft is recommended. I used a tractor for levelling and there is no need for manual labour,” he says.

Moreover, a tree yields fruits for 70 years. “Even if the actual lifespan is 50 years, it is highly profitable,” he adds.

Jagdish says date is a hardy plant and does not require much inputs except cow dung manure and water. 

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Drip irrigation and intercropping

He has installed drip irrigation to take water directly to the roots. He does not have to use much water for dates because he also intercrops soybeans with them. 

“We harvested around 7 quintals of soybean planted between date trees last season. It also helps provide nutrition to date plants through nitrogen fixation,” he says.

In winter, he plants wheat. “Whatever water is added to wheat, also reaches dates. So there is no separate requirement for watering dates,” Jagdish says.

Date plants require manual pollination. Date palms develop as either a male or female of the species. While the males produce pollen from flowers, natural pollination is not effective.

“For 100 female plants, you need six male plants for manual pollination,” explains Jagdish. 

Once flowering in female plants starts, he takes pollens from male flowers and sprays them on female plants. “It is done early in the morning from February 15 to March 15 during the flowering season and I do it myself without hiring labour,” he adds.

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Harvest and income

The first flowers in his date plants appeared in 2023. “We harvested the first crop that year,” he says. The yield was 4 tonnes (4,000 kg) from three acres.

Harvesting of dates starts in June and lasts till mid-August. 

“Since the yield improves over time, we harvested 14 tonnes (14000 kg) in 2024,” he says. 

The income was Rs24 lakh from three acres (Rs8 lakh per acre),” she says. Since he gave away dates for free to friends and relatives, and at Rs100 per kg to some wholesalers on request, the income was Rs24 lakh instead of Rs28 lakh.

“In the 2025 season, we expect the yield to cross 20 tonnes and it might stabilize at 20 to 22 tonnes after that,” he adds.  

“We sell the fruits from our farm. The unsold produce is kept in cold storage where it remains fresh for 1.5 months,” he says, adding that he plans to increase the area under date cultivation over time.

(Rashmi Pratap is a Mumbai-based journalist specialising in business, financial, and socio-economic reporting)

Also Read: How this farmer earns Rs 6 lakh per acre from organic farming of dates

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