Growing Bamboo in Nicaragua

A great investment opportunity

1. Why growing bamboo?

Every year, precious tropical hard woods and forests are being cut down, slashed and burned. Restoring those natural forests would take several generations, therefore we need to find faster solutions that can substitute conventional wood application and continue to convert CO2 into oxygen. The answer is Bamboo!

Bamboo belongs to the family of grasses and is one of the fastest growing plants on earth. It is NOT a tree, but quite simply grass… In just 1 growing season, stems reach their full height. It takes another 3 years, however, for the bamboos to harden and reach maturity.

Every Manzana with bamboo produces 30,000 liters of water/year and has an  "underground network” root system, some 20 Km (12 miles) long. This same network enriches and protects the soil from erosion, giving life and nutrients to the top layer.

Bamboo also captures CO2 and converts it into oxygen, substantially more than regular trees. Recent studies indicate that the potential for atmospheric carbon dioxide fixation in the first six years of Guadua's growth from new sowings is 54 metric tons per hectare.

Bamboo has been classified as having over 1500 different uses, including fences, furniture, laminates, music instruments, food products and every part of a building. Asian cultures have a saying that a man is born in a bamboo cradle and goes away in a bamboo coffin. Everything in between is possible with bamboo.

In Latin America, structures of the native timber Guadua bamboo are popular with both rich and poor. A good example is the work of Colombian Architect Simon Velez. He - more than anyone else maybe - has popularized the use of Guadua for house building.

                     

2. What kind of bamboo do we grow?

Guadua Aculeata Seedling

For every bamboo plantation, we use exclusively the seedlings of two of the best bamboo species worldwide. They are Guadua Angustifolia and Guadua Aculeata. Both species are native to Central America. We are blessed with having them in Nicaragua and were even more blessed with the flowering of those bamboos in 2008-2009.

Flowering occurs only ONCE in a lifetime for bamboos. After that, they slowly fade away and die. Growing bamboo from seeds, will give bamboo a life span of 100 years, and guarantee us a healthy, strong and vigorous bamboo plantation.

 

3. Where are we growing bamboo?

The natural habitat for our Guadua Bamboo in Nicaragua is the Atlantic Coast region, because of the quantity of rain and the type of soil. So, we have chosen 3 places where we will start planting bamboo.

• Waslala (Red Arrow): 250 Km. from Managua. NE/Nicaragua
• El Jobo Rio Blanco (Blue Arrow): 200 Km. from Managua. Central Nicaragua.
• Muelle de los Bueyes (Green Arrow): 275 Km. from Managua. Close to the city of Rama (Seaport).
• El Crucero (Managua) at 30 Km from the capital and already owned by Guadua Bamboo.

We choose those places because of the presence of natural grown bamboo and the availability of high quality parcels.

4. Nicaragua Investment Plan

Each Manzana (1.73 Acres) sells for: US$ 5,500.00

This includes:

• Land (1 manzana) with a Certified Title registered in your name or your company’s name. This land is located on one of our designated locations, best suited to grow bamboo.
• Lawyer and topographer fees.
• 500 new Guadua bamboo seedlings, skillfully planted. If we plant bamboo in 2010, we can harvest the first ones in 2014 and from there on, every year, without re-planting! In 2014, we can harvest 20,000 Linear Meters of solid 6“ building material from each and every Manzana we planted in 2010. That generates a passive income every year from 2014 on until 2110 …
• Full time maintenance (fertilizing, cleaning, pruning) and consultancy. Guadua Bamboo makes sure all seedlings are carefully planted, fertilized, irrigated, and weeds are eliminated. Existing groves are pruned, and cleared from over-mature culms to ensure a healthy bamboo plantation. It is in Guadua Bamboo's best interest to maintain their investors plantations since we buy the bamboo from you.

Just watch your money grow, every day!

At the end of the fourth year you will earn a passive income of approximately US$ 1,200.00 per Manzana every year. These profits are calculated by the amount of bamboo "trees" that can be harvested per year per manzana. Guadua Bamboo than purchases and harvests your crop and distributes the cured and dried poles to its clientele worldwide.

 

5. Our Mission

We think that the world financial crisis is a good moment to make a stop and start thinking seriously about the future of our planet and the people living on it. If we don’t change radically and start to respect nature, we will go the wrong way and further destroy our beautiful earth.

If - on the contrary - we start to look more closely at what mother earth offers us as a strong, sustainable platform for a steady, ecological growth, we will do “the right thing“. Bamboo is our best friend out there. It is native, available and of the highest quality we can possibly dream of.

 

6. Our Vision

We strongly believe in the ecological and economical strengths of growing bamboo as a substitute for wood, as a natural building material and a producer of oxygen and water.

When planting bamboo in an orderly way, we can harvest it in a never-ending cycle of beautiful, straight, strong, earthquake-resistant poles.

We do know that we can build sustainable and affordable houses, bridges, schools and hotels and make a fair amount of money as well. Remember that your little Manzana produces enough bamboo to build almost 30 low income houses every year!

By teaching and promoting the possibilities with bamboo in a certain region, local communities will copy our activities, which should result into a large bamboo community center or cooperation. Obviously we cannot do this alone, therefore we ask passionate investors to join our efforts and also teach and share their knowledge in their particular field of interest.

Our ultimate goal is to set up a cooperation that includes all kinds of private investors who are passionately involved with bamboo and all it's application. Guadua Bamboo S.A. itself owns property in the exact same areas, and with the help of a strong coop we could further work on bamboo innovation in the region.

Due to our market position and our top positions on the internet, we then advertise all activities of our investors on our website who on their turn can turn their passion into a full time and profitable business. Guadua Bamboo concentrates its efforts in education, promotions and export of the raw material, while we help and stimulate investors to invest their energy into innovative activities. All combined and promoted by Guadua Bamboo Central America.

 

7. Guadua Plantations Video

This video shows the Guadua bamboo plantations in Nicaragua. Notice the flowering of Guadua Aculeata. The first part is in Spanish the second part in English.

 

8. Frequently Asked Questions

Learn more about our Guadua Bamboo Plantations Program.