Small-Scale Oilseed Processing: Evaluating Edible Camelina Oil for its Market Demand and Value-Added Opportunities

Small-Scale Oilseed Processing: Evaluating Edible Camelina Oil for its Market Demand and Value-Added Opportunities

Summary

WORK ACTIVITIES
The following details our first-year project activities: planted 8 acres camelina and worked with Agricultural Utilization and Research Institute to develop nutrition panel (March 2011); met with small business consultant to develop business structure and marketing strategies (May 2011); created business plan; developed business name, logo, and label and pressed 2010 crop into oil (June 2011); harvested and cleaned 2011 crop (July 2011); test pressed 2011 seed to compare with 2010 oil (Sept 2011); designed three-fold informational brochure and developed website (Oct 2011); bottled first batch of oil and began information sharing regarding camelina oil and our project (Nov 2011); officially began marketing the oil for sale as a healthy, culinary oil (Dec 2011); sent sample bottles to potential retailers, started conducting in-store samples, featured in two local newspapers (Jan 2012).

Grant funds during our first year were used for the following: personnel expenses covered the costs of planting/harvesting/cleaning camelina seed, conducting outreach activities, design/development (business planning, logo, oil bottle label, informational brochure) website design, sales/marketing, and project-related bookkeeping. Non-personnel expenses went towards fuel to grow camelina seed, transportation to and from the oil press and printers, oil pressing, supplies (55-gallon drums, hand pump, bottles, and labels), and printing costs (labels and informational brochures).

RESULTS
We spent many hours further researching and developing the best options to grow, sell, and market camelina as a healthy, edible culinary oil. The tangible results of our project thus far include: our first batch of oil bottled, labeled, and available for sale, a website and informational brochure, a business plan and cost analysis, and our second crop of seed in storage for pressing in the coming year. Our oil is currently for sale at two Minnesota food coops, and we anticipate adding more retailers very soon. We conducted a cost analysis that concluded it is profitable to process, bottle, and distribute camelina oil given the retail price that other camelina oil producers are selling it for.

We have found camelina to be a hearty, competitive, low-input crop that grows well in southern Minnesota. It yields an average of 1,000 lbs cleaned seed/acre with 30-40% oil content when cold-pressed. We estimate average oil production to be 38 gallons/acre. Camelina meal makes an excellent feed supplement for cattle; it’s high-energy and contains about 40% protein.

We spring planted it using the grass seed attachment on a drill (at the setting for red clover) at a rate of about 5 lbs/acres. Next year we will probably increase that rate to 7 lbs/acre for better coverage. After sprinkling the seed onto the ground, we packed it for good seed-to-soil contact. The seed is ready to harvest in mid-July when about 80% of the pods turn orange. We windrowed the plants and combine harvested the seed. Camelina is drought-resistant (the 2011 crop grew well despite an unusually rainy spring and a very dry summer and fall). It’s also very competitive with weeds and fits well into a corn, soybeans, wheat/camelina rotation. A mid-July harvest means there is time to work the ground post-harvest and put in a cover crop or nitrogen-fixing legume.

WORK PLAN FOR 2012
The primary focus of our work plan for the second year is to continue sharing and promoting information about our project and marketing camelina as a healthy, edible oil. We will attend an organic farming conference, participate in a local organic field day, work with local food coops to promote/demo camelina oil, and perform additional information dissemination (see section four for more details). We hope to plant another crop of camelina in 2012 and continue to bottle and sell our oil, although this will depend on how well it sells in the first half of 2012.

OUTREACH
Because our first year of the grant was focused on market research and product development, the majority of our information dissemination will take place in 2012. We did, however, do several things in 2011 as a means of sharing information about camelina and our project with others.

We developed informational materials that we already have and will continue to share with farmers, grocers, and consumers. We created a website that provides background and other educational information on the camelina plant and its oil. We also designed a three-fold brochure that is available for download on the website and that we distribute at meetings, conferences, and field days. The printed brochure is currently available at the two local food coops that carry our product, and it will be shared with other food coops in the coming year.

We sampled the oil at a local food coop in January 2012 with very promising results. Approximately 200 people participated in the sampling. In addition to this, our project was featured in two local newspapers in January 2012 and is scheduled to appear in a large Midwestern ag publication in the spring of 2012.

In 2012 we have several strategies for sharing information with others:

-Midwest Organic Farming Conference in La Crosse, WI: we will have a table that showcases camelina oil and also participate in camelina pressing demos with an oil press manufacturer
-a news article featuring our project is planned for the spring edition of a prominent Midwestern agricultural periodical
-demonstrations: we will conduct in-store samples at several Minnesota food coops
-Minnesota Institute for Sustainable Agriculture board meeting: we will attend and share project information
-increase awareness for camelina oil by promoting our website and distributing our brochure to interested parties
-participate in the local Organic Field Day organized by the University of MN agriculture research station: we plan to present our project at this event (and if we grow a crop in 2012, we also plan to host a site visit)

In our final report, we will be able to provide more numbers detailing people who: visit our table at the conference, attend the organic field day and board meeting, and participate in our in-store samplings. We will also be able to report on the number of local retailers that carry our oil.

Collaborators: