JACKFRUIT PRODUCTION GUIDE

Jackfruit is one of the sweetest fruit in town. This is the favorite fruit in rural areas. Once ripen, it has a sweet-smelling odor that even how you hide it somewhere or pack it closely in a container, the odor will always resist and comes out telling people of their presence.

It is not raised in large scale before because of hard marketability of the fruits in the market. The demand is not as high as expected. But now, many manufacturers of fruit products noticed jackfruit to have great potential to win the taste of the consumer by converting the fruits into sweetened fruits in cans with heavy syrup. It was also made into dried products in tetra packs. Increase in sales began to pick-up as the products are now has the spot in many supermarkets as demand slowly increases.

There are many varieties of jackfruit. It differed in the thickness of its flesh. There are other colors like light green or heavy yellow. It also includes the size and form of the fruit, the degree of sweetness and period of growth until maturity.

Select variety that has thick flesh of its fruit, very sweet, produce high yield per season, no latex inside the ripen fruits.

To shorten the duration of growth until bearing age, use grafted plants. It can be bought in fruit nursery of your locality or ask the help of someone who knows how to graft the branches. Seeds planted directly to the soil needs longer growing years compared to grafted one.

The fruit tree can grow to any type of soil especially in well-drained, deep and alluvial soils.

Plant the grafted seedlings in spacing of 10 meters x 10 meters.

Water the grafted seedlings or direct seeding regularly as it need lots of moisture in the first year of its growth. This is to avoid water stress that may cause stunted growth. Water it if the surface around the plants becomes dry. Watering does not end during the growing years. It is also needed during maturity age to induce heavy flowering and fruit set. If adequate moisture to the soil is given, it grow healthy, robust and develop fast into matured trees and gives better fruit quality and sweetness.

To assist to correct the infertility of the soil, apply inorganic fertilizer per tree during bearing age annually. The rate of application is 10 kilos under the following schedules:

                  4 kilos (9-24-24) – before flowering stage

                  4 kilos (15-15-15) after fruit setting

                  2 kilos (8-24-24) – a month before the fruit mature

Additionally, add organic fertilizer or animal manure with the rate of 50 kilos per tree throughout the year. Use foliar fertilizer (10-52-15) 3 times a year when the plants bear fruits. It can be done by spraying the liquid fertilizer for effectiveness.

During its growing years, make it a point to check the plants of damaging pests like fruit fly and fruit borer that may affect the quality of the fruits. Spray it with chemicals manufactured for fruit-bearing trees available in agricultural supply to assist prevention of pests. The most effective way to protect the fruits is by means of bagging method using rice sacks to allow aeration inside as the fruits are on the ripening stage. Bag the fruits to ideal size of 300 grams.

If the disease affects the whole structure of the plant, spray it with recommended fungicides to put a stop of the infection especially fungus in the ground.  Other preventive measures can be done by regular schedule of weeding to remove unproductive branches, wider spacing of planted trees giving enough moisture to the soil and keeping the plant healthy and well-attended giving the necessary soil nutrients for the plant to become vigorous and robust.

In order for the plants to produce high yield, do the following:

-Produce multiple trunks 7 or more branches, cut the main trunk 50 centimeters above the ground. Such action will induce formation of multiple branches giving the plants some space for better light penetration and movement of air.

-As the plant matures, do pruning by removing the sprouts to those unhealthy branches, diseased and unproductive.

-Top cut the tree higher than one meter above the ground. This is to allow the plant to bear more healthy branches that may bear many fruits in a branch.

Harvest some of young fruits in case of overcrowding to allow others to develop properly. Sell the excess young fruits to the market. Housewives used it as vegetable salad.