9.1 Global production of Jatropha

Jatropha is a shrub, belonging to the Euphorbiaceae family, thriving in various environments and across a wide range of ecosystems. It is a plant that can survive several months with minimal water and can actually live up to 40 years or more. It is not edible to human beings or animals. The jatropha industry is in its very early stages, covering a global area estimated at some 900,000 ha. More than 85 percent of jatropha plantings are in Asia, chiefly Myanmar, India, China and Indonesia. Africa accounts for around 12 percent or approximately 120,000 ha, mostly in Madagascar and Zambia, but also in Tanzania and Mozambique. The West African nations of Mali, Ghana and Senegal have also established lofty production targets for Jatropha notably; to cultivate 320,000 ha of Jatropha curcas in Senegal by 2012 and 1 million ha in Ghana in the medium term (OECD, 2008). Latin America has approximately 20,000 ha of jatropha, mostly in Brazil. The area planted with jatropha was projected to grow to 4.72 million ha by 2010 and 12.8 million ha by 2015. By then, Indonesia is expected to be the largest producer in Asia with 5.2 million ha, Ghana and Madagascar together will have the largest area in Africa with 1.1 million ha, and Brazil is projected to be the largest producer in Latin America with 1.3 million ha. Total biogas generation potential from Jatropha curcas cakes in India has been estimated as 2,550 million m3 from 10.2 lakh metric ton of J. curcas oil seed cakes.

Jatropha curcas contains about 30% oil leaving behind presscake (75% including about 5% losses of oil in extraction process in the mechanical expeller) with residual oil. The oil is used for preparing bio-diesel (Achten et al., 2008) and in soap preparation. The press cake is rich in organic matter (Abreu, 2009). It can be used as manure, as feedstock for biogas production, animal feed and so forth. (Agarwal, 2007). Also, Jatropha oil cake is used for enriching the soil (Reyadh, 1997). Envis (2004) observed that Jatropha oil cake is an organic fertilizer that is superior to cattle manure and it is in great demand by farmers.