HALABJA, Kurdistan Region - Azad Muhammed, 44, has been farming for 35 years and gathered nearly 300 tons of products from 25 various crops in 2016. He has also discovered solutions for several plant diseases and has consequently been awarded for his innovativeness by the local and international organizations.
“I have had 250 to 300 tons of products this year alone,” Muhammed, who owns 1.5 hectares of land, which has been turned into an orchard growing at least 25 various kinds of agricultural products, told Rudaw.
“I make a living out of my agricultural products and I plant them with my own hands,” Muhammed added.
He sympathizes with Kurdish farmers who are disgruntled over the fact they cannot earn a living from the products they make.
“They have all the right to complain because they have marketing problems," due to the financial crisis the Kurdistan Region has been facing for two and a half years, Muhammed reasoned.
Muhammed owns some 18 plastic planthouses which he uses to grow a variety of fruits and vegetables; cucumbers, grapes, melons, watermelons, tomatoes pepper and many others.
High summer temperatures have made it almost impossible to farm outside the plastic shade houses, which diminish the heat of the sun significantly.
In his orchard there are two types of grapes. One is green and the other is ripened. He explained to Rudaw that he has not “irrigated the green grape for almost four months. And for the other one I have made a substance for it, which includes; ashes and cow dung and as you can see the grapes of this vine have all ripened after I used the substance,” he explained, pointing at his vine.
The experienced Kurdish farmer has made several manures. “If our farmers are acquainted with this manure, their expenditures will largely decrease,” he remarked about some pungent manure.
He went on to describe that the substances of this manure are “birds’ manure, cow dung and ashes.”
The idea of using ashes to make manure dates back to a few months ago when he “burnt the wild weed that grew freely in my cucumber farm for eight years. For the next harvest season I discovered, to my surprise, that the size of the cucumbers had increased by 40 percent compared to other places where I did not burn any weeds,” Muhammed told Rudaw.
After that discovery, Muhammed continued to use the ashes while combining it with other substances in order to expand his harvest.
His reputation as a skilled farmer spread very quickly after a Japanese organization in the area approached him with an offer to grow broccoli.
“They provided me with a new plastic plant-house in which I grew the broccoli seeds that I received from them,” Muhammed said, while also cultivating the seed in some of his own farms using his own techniques. The results were astonishing.
“My crop was ready to be collected 15 days earlier than the other plant which I managed together with the Japanese organization,” he said. His broccoli was also twice as big as theirs.
After Muhammed became famous in his own town farmers in other parts of the region visited him, taking a sample of their lands with them for Muhammed to inspect.
“I solved nematode disease by 80% from a sample a farmer gave me,” Muhammed said.
The Halabja province is rich in pomegranate produce. But a deadly disease has affected this produce.
Through Muhammed’s mixed substances for the solution of the planet diseases, pomegranate is in a better condition recently compared to the past.
“We have an insect that farmers have tried to kill using pesticides, but they lay eggs and their offspring cause the same problem all over again.”
“We have discovered a solution for the pomegranate’s flower which does not let it [this insect] hatch,” Muhammed said.
The Kurdistan Region Government’s Ministry of Agriculture and Water Resources has already supported Muhammed in his great innovation which is being emulated.
