The role that this many sided but very familiar and humble plant of neem plays in our country’s economy is worth being emphasised. This also has many lessons for our future planners for health and environmental care. We shall point this out in the section entitled some prospective suggestions later. Here we are concerned with some interesting aspects of its commercial cultivation and exploitation.
Agro-forestry is a new word that has come into prominence in recent years. In very lay terms, this means the application of agricultural practices to forest development. This is most useful for dry land farmers who would like to get maximum profits from growing such tree crops best suited for dry lands where water fall is not much.
Neem is one of the most suited plants for this purpose. Such trees (an other example is subabul with its many sided benefits) axe unaffected by droughts and floods and also assure an unfailing profit. They also aid in conserving soil moisture and enriching soil fertility.
Trees such as neem fetch good and regular return from the sixth years of planting. A hectare of neem trees assures Rs., 7,500/- worth seeds each year. The seed yield gradually increases to stabilise in the tenth year of planting, when the income can be as high as Rs. 15,000/- per year (as shown in a report of 1990).
A good procedure is to raise a mixed plantation of neem and teak both of which are very useful and need similar climatic conditions. This is what has been already done by some progressive farmers of Tamil Nadu.
Extracting neem oil from the seeds had been a cottage industry in India. Soon after Independence Planning Committee of our Country had prepared a scheme of promoting this industry in a big way by opening one Centre for oil extraction by modem means and on an industrial scale.
The idea was to utilise the entire neem seed crop of our country and also to release the edible oils which were being used till then to soap formation and others which would therefore be based henceforth only through non-neem oil. However, it is only Tamil Nadu which has registered a great advance in neem seed production.
This state alone collects twenty one thousand and two hundred seventy tons per year; its oil production is one thousand six hundred and eighty tons. Both are planned to be increased much further (1985 report).
England had planned to import neem oil from our country on a large scale. However this idea was given up soon since a very foul and repulsive smell was found to arise during such a massive use of neem oil industrially. But ways have been found now to remove the bitterness of the oil almost completely and also reduce the foul smell to a great extent. Washing – soap manufacturing with neem oil is a great industry now.