NEF opens facilities to supply miscanthus rhizomes

New Energy Farms (NEF), a North American-based commercial trading and development company for energy crops, in particular miscanthus, has opened two large-scale facilities for the supply of miscanthus rhizomes.

Two production sites are now operational, one in Ontario, Canada, and the other in Georgia in the US.

From these sites NEF can produce tens of thousands of acres of miscanthus rhizomes from 2011 onwards.

The Georgia site is located at NEF's US propagation partners Lewis Taylor Farms' 4,000-acre vegetable unit in the city of Tifton.

'With the opening of these sites NEF is providing miscanthus at the volume and price demanded by farmers, to make large-scale crop establishment possible and economic,' says Dean Tiessen, president of NEF. 'This is part of our ongoing commitment to reduce the establishment cost for our customers for miscanthus and other energy crops'.

As Paul Carver, CEO of NEF explains, 'We supply material with the optimum bud frequency, moisture and nutrient content for good establishment. This can only be achieved with our material from high quality propagation sites; not all rhizomes are equal.'