Authors : M. Hasmah, A. T. Syukrie, M. Sulaiman, M. Suraiya, B. Raffhanah, A.R. Nazirin, R. Muyan, M.F. Noh and M.K. Rasyid
Abstract: The cultivation of mature and immature palm trees covers a total of 5.64 million hectares representing 52% of the total area (10.9 million hectares) designated for agriculture and 17% of overall Malaysian territory (Ministry of Plantation Industries and Commodities). However, oil palm industries produce lignocellulosic biomass from oil palm trunks, Empty Fruit Bunches (EFB), Oil Palm Fronds (OPF), palm pressed fibres and shells. Oil palm waste was detected to have considerable amounts of carbon (43-51 wt.%) and fixed carbon (30-39 wt.%) showing potential to be converted into carbon-rich biochar. In view on this, we conducted this study to determine and evaluate the effects of biochar from oil palm frond and EFB on sweet corn yield. The experimental site was located at Farm Unit, UiTM Samarahan, Sarawak Branch. The experiment consisted of 5 treatments, each treatment consisting of 80 plants, replicated 3 times which gave a total of 1200 sweet corn plants laid out in a Randomized Complete Block Design (RCBD) arrangement from April-July 2018. Parameters measured at harvest 85 DAT included the fresh and dry biomass, the number of cobs and cobs grade. The number of cobs produced on each plant was counted, weighed and graded, according to scale: grade A (>200 g per cob), grade B (100-200 g per cob) and grade C (<100 g per cob). All of the recorded data were compared by the Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) using SAS 9.4 (2013). The result indicated treatment T5 (EFB biochar+foliar fertiliser) was the best treatment combination for both biomass and cobs weight with the value of 149.28 and 316.12 g, respectively (p<0.0001) as compared to control. T4 (EFB biochar 100%) produce lower yield as compared to T5 probably due to the application of foliar spray. EFB biochar+foliar fertiliser can be recommended to boost sweet corn yield.
M. Hasmah, A. T. Syukrie, M. Sulaiman, M. Suraiya, B. Raffhanah, A.R. Nazirin, R. Muyan, M.F. Noh and M.K. Rasyid, 2019. Effect of Biochar from Oil Palm Waste on Sweet Corn Yield. Journal of Engineering and Applied Sciences, 14: 6072-6076.