One of the common questions that we get from potential sweet potato farmers in Kenya is the potential yield that they could get per acre. Here, we do a rough estimate of the potential yield per acre of sweet potatoes if you do everything right. This estimate has been based on average yield on produce in Homa Bay Kenya, where our farms are based but it could basically be applied everywhere.

Land Preparation

Cost of Tilling an Acre of Land: Ksh.3000

Retilling Cost: Ksh.2500

Cost of Preparing Mounds/Ridges for Planting Sweet Potatoes: Ksh.2500

Cost of Vines

To plant an acre of sweet potatoes you need anywhere from 15 to 20 bags of vines

Cost of a bag of vines: Ksh.1500

Cost of vines for an acre: Ksh.22,500 to Ksh.30,000

Cost of Planting

Cost of planting a line with sweet potato vines: Ksh.50

An acre will have anywhere from 80 to 110 lines depending on your spacing

Cost of planting an acre at Ksh.50 per line is Ksh.4000 to Ksh.5500

Cost of Weeding an Acre

A line costs Ksh.50

Cost of weeding an acre costs Ksh.4000 to Ksh.5500

Cost of Harvesting Sweet Potatoes

An acre of sweet potatoes should yield 10 90Kg bags of medium to large sized sweet potatoes on the lower side and 20 to 25 bags on the higher side. Additionally, you should be able to get at least 10 bags of small sized sweet potatoes which are still marketable.

The cost of removing the sweet potato tendrils just before harvesting is generally Ksh.1500 to Ksh.2000 per acre.

The cost of digging up sweet potatoes is Ksh.2500 to Ksh.3000n per acre

Cost of picking and bagging sweet potatoes is generally Ksh.100 to Ksh.200 per person. You will need 5 to 10 people for quick labour to pick and bag the sweet potatoes.

Cost of bags for bagging the sweet potatoes in the farm. You need about 50 bags. Each bag goes for Ksh.40. So total is Ksh.2000.

Cost of transporting from the farm to the roadside or the places where the sweet potatoes are to be washed before rebagged for the markets is roughly Ksh.1000 to Ksh.2000 depending on the means of transport.

Cost of washing your sweet potatoes is Ksh.50 per bag. For an acre, you will spend anywhere around Ksh.1000 to wash all the bags.

Cost of bagging the sweet potatoes is Ksh.50 per bag so you are going to spend about Ksh.1000 to Ksh.1500 to bag all your sweet potatoes.

Cost of loading sweet potatoes to canters is generally Ksh.50 per bag so you will spend roughly Ksh.1000 or slightly more to load all bags into canter.

Cost of transporting from Nyanza to Nairobi is Ksh.600 per bag. Cost of transporting 20 bags of sweet potatoes is Ksh.12,000. If you live close to Nairobi, the cost is reduced considerably.

Cost of unloading in Nairobi is Ksh.100 per bag so to unload 20 bags will cost you roughly Ksh.2000 or more.

Rates charged by Nairobi City Council is Ksh.200 per bag so you will spend roughly Ksh.4000 as rates for your sweet potatoes.

Sweet Potato Marketing

Market price for the medium to large sized sweet potatoes ranges anywhere from Ksh.6000 to Ksh.7500 for the 90kg bag depending on the season. So per acre cost revenues would be Ksh.120,000 to Ksh.150,000 for the large to medium sized sweet potatoes.

Market price for small sized sweet potatoes is Ksh.600 to Ksh.1000 per acre so revenues for 20 bags would be Ksh.12,000 to Ksh.20,000.

Total Revenues

Total revenues would be roughly Ksh.132,000 to Ksh.170,000

Total expenses would be roughly Ksh.70,000 to Ksh.78,000 from planting to harvest.

Profits per acre: Rough Ks.62,000 to Ksh.92,000

Depending on the season of harvest, the yield per acre and how you manage your costs, your profits per acre would be anywhere from Ksh.62,000 to Ksh.92,000.

Keep in mind that you could reduce your profit margins when you harvest your sweet potatoes at the “wrong” time when the market prices are low. During “wrong” times, the market prices can go as low as Ksh.4000. Before harvesting sweet potatoes, keep an eye on the market price. Sweet potatoes can remain fresh in the soils for an extended period of time so you can leave them there for a while if the market conditions are still not favourable.

How to Maximize Profits Per Acre When Planting Sweet Potatoes

There are plenty of ways to maximize profits from your sweet potato farm right from the onset of your planting. You could do that in the following ways:-

• Prepare land early and plant at the onset of rains so that you can harvest when prices are at their peak.
• Secure good sweet potato vines from a reliable supply that will supply you with healthy stems.
• Negotiate good rates for sweet potato vines. Currently, we sell our sweet potato vines for Ksh.1500 per bag but for bulk orders, we can offer farmers some discount.
• Weed your sweet potatoes in time after two and a half months.
• Negotiate cost of labour at various stages so as to cut down on costs
• Secure cheap transportation to the markets especially from canters that are returning empty to Nairobi.
• Pout more acreage of land under sweet potatoes if you can afford it. If you can make Ksh.92,000 per acre within five and a half to six months, you can make as much as Ksh.500,000 within the same period if you put 5 acres under cultivation or Ksh.1,000,000 if put 10 acres of sweet potatoes under cultivation.

Need assistance with your planting, give us a call today.