A wasabi farm cost is variable dependent upon a whole range of different factors.
You cannot come up with a realistic figure until you have gone through a number of steps as shown in the diagram below.
This is because most of the items in the diagram are dependent on each other.
The top four items are the ones that have the most affect on the wasabi farm cost, with the land and weather sections being predominant. The closer you can get to the preferred growing requirements of the wasabi plant to begin with then the less cost is involved.
The more extreme the weather and the slope of the land is then you can expect the wasabi farm cost to increase significantly. This is especially true when people rush ahead like an enraged elephant without considering other options. 🙂 I have seen people move half a mountain to get a flat area for the farm, when what they had could have been used if they had only asked. 🙁
A final wasabi farm cost can only be determined when all aspects of the above diagram have been investigated and decisions made. This includes design and layout as well as all the other little bits necessary to get things running. The cost of the plants is actually a small part of the whole wasabi farm cost, whereas a lot of people seem to think it is the major cost. The major cost both in terms of time and other resources is the planning that needs to be done before even starting construction.
It is not unusual that it takes 6 – 20 months to get everything sorted out prior to construction, another 6 months to get things put together and the first plants growing. Then you have to wait 12 – 18 months for the wasabi plants to grow enough so they can be harvested and sold.
All this waiting and growing time must also be added in the wasabi farm cost.
Here is a simple spreadsheet that tells you how much land you will need for your wasabi farm. The result is dependent on the market price (spreadsheet here) and how you are selling the wasabi (rhizome, per lb, per kilo).