Economic aspects of vermicompost production in southern Serbia

Zoran Stojiljković,Jelena Vanovac,Jasmina Stojiljković,Dragutin Đukić,Mile Peševski

doi:10.5937/aaser2049019s

Abstract

Given the accelerated technical and technological development in the field of agricultural production of the 21st century, which aims to increase production quantitatively, the quality of primary agricultural products is in many cases unfairly neglected. This has directly aroused consumer awareness of the inevitable transition to purchasing products from alternative production methods (self-produced "healthy food", organic food production). For these reasons, the consumer alternative is to switch to environmentally friendly and health-safe products obtained from agricultural production and to use them in the future. A very promising product of this kind in the Republic of Serbia is vermicompost. Vermicompost is widely used in primary agricultural production: fruits and vegetables, mushroom production, horticulture, nurseries, green areas, parks, green sports fields, and in all segments of organic plant production. The benefits that farmers have from using vermicompost are a prerequisite for this product to be marketed in Serbia. This paper describes the benefits for both vermicompost manufacturers and consumers and the wider community.

Highlights

Vermicompost is a coprolite of Californian red worms
The Ministry of Agriculture of the Republic of Serbia will not stimulate the production of vermicompost for the time being, so the entire production is not planned for
Producers of vermicompost in Serbia do not have any assistance in setting up a bio-waste processing plant, which slows down the development of this method of bio-waste processing

Summary

Introduction

Vermicompost is a coprolite of Californian red worms This product is obtained by processing the nutrients that Californian worms use in their lives, and they are waste and are added to organized and planned production at specific time intervals (feeding Californian worms) to the "habitats" in which they live and multiply. The quality of vermicompost depends primarily on the materials that the worms processed in their lifecycle, as evidenced by the contents of certain chemical components in the final product that determine the final product and its price (total organic matter, humic acids, micro elements ...) (Lončarić et al., 2005). The main raw material used for the production of vermicompost is a mixture of different types of rotted manure (Vukobratović, 2008), obtained in our environment primarily from cattle. The production of vermicompost should be located next to the source of manure (livestock farms) because manure is a dangerous product that pollutes the environment (Karmakar et al, 2007) and is a cheap product with a cumbersome structure and causes higher transport costs, increasing the cost of vermicompost production

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Conclusion