Shandan County Supports the Edible Mushroom Industry to Help Farmers Get Rich
Reporter Qi Xingfu, Correspondent Qian Dawei
Low investment, quick results, high returns??In recent years, Shandan County has increased its efforts to attract investment and support edible mushroom enterprises, organized and mobilized the broad masses of cadres and people to develop the edible mushroom industry, explored the "company + base + cooperative + farmers" edible mushroom development model, and created a new path out of poverty toward prosperity.
Right now, walking through the townships along the mountains in Shandan County, the edible mushroom greenhouses scattered across the fields are particularly eye-catching. "These mushrooms are now our treasure for getting rich." said Zhou Xiang, a grower in Gaozhai Village, Weiqi Town, who was picking mushrooms in a greenhouse. The returns from his mushroom growing are getting better year after year. Taking the current batch of shiitake mushrooms as an example, the purchase price is 8 yuan per kg, and each greenhouse can produce at least 10,000 kg. After deducting costs, the annual income from 3 greenhouses is at least more than 100,000 yuan.
"In the final analysis, I also have to thank the government for its support." Zhou Xiang said that in the past, some villagers in other villages had also tried growing mushrooms, but none succeeded due to problems with technology, sales and other aspects. In 2015, through government guidance, he got in touch with the county's leading edible mushroom enterprise??Gansu Aifu Agricultural Development Co., Ltd. This enterprise not only helped him build mushroom greenhouses, but also provided reliable spawn and technical services. After the mushrooms were harvested, the enterprise came to collect them. In the first year, Zhou Xiang recovered all his costs.
In recent years, Aifu Company, following the "leading enterprise + base + cooperative + farmers" approach and an operational development model of unified supply of mushroom substrate, unified technical standards, unified demonstration mushroom greenhouses, unified product collection, unified product processing, and unified brand sales to edible mushroom growers, has driven and guided people in Shandan and even surrounding cities and counties to grow edible mushrooms, leading large numbers of people onto the road out of poverty toward prosperity.
Through several years of development, the edible mushroom industry, with its low investment, quick results and high returns, has become a "staunch" crop on the land of Shandan. Taking this as an opportunity, Shandan County has optimized the development environment, fully promoted the development of the edible mushroom industry, and strived to build a "strong county for the development of the edible mushroom industry in the Hexi Corridor." It established a leading group for coordinating the development of the edible mushroom industry to comprehensively coordinate guidance and coordination for the development of the edible mushroom industry. It formulated and issued a series of plans such as the Measures for Reward and Subsidy for Modern Agriculture Development in Shandan County in 2017 and related support policies, opening a "green channel" for the edible mushroom industry.
In response to problems in the development of the edible mushroom industry such as lack of funds, technology and talent, Shandan County adopted the method of "a portion from bank loans, a portion from investment attraction, a portion raised by farmers, a portion subsidized by finance, and a portion invested by projects" to raise funds through multiple channels. Since 2010, the county government has arranged a special fund of 30 million yuan each year to support modern agriculture mainly based on edible mushrooms. In 2016 it increased to 40 million yuan, and this year it increased again to 50 million yuan. The scope of subsidies covers many links including mushroom greenhouses, mushroom sticks, environmental regulation facilities, brand building, quality and safety, and product collection. In order to let farmers master edible mushroom technology, it also hired professors from the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences and the Institute of Microbiology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences as consultants for industrial development, and introduced a group of edible mushroom professionals to provide technical support for the smooth development of the industry.
Walking into the mushroom cultivation greenhouses of Gansu Aifu Agricultural Development Co., Ltd., the iron frames more than 2 m high are filled with mushroom sticks, and fresh mushrooms cover the sticks. The person in charge of the company's extension department told the reporter that fungi can be produced all year round, output is guaranteed, and returns are very stable.
In recent years, Shandan County has guided enterprises to base themselves on high starting-point positioning and take the path of factory-based and large-scale development, giving the industry strong momentum for development. According to the characteristics of edible mushroom varieties, resource conditions, production status, technical advantages and other features, it has carefully planned the layout for the development of the edible mushroom industry, focused on building the development pattern of the edible mushroom industry, and gradually established a professional, mechanized, standardized and intensive edible mushroom industry development model with "a leading enterprise for the industry, a center for research and development, a base for production, and an enterprise for marketing."
At the same time, Shandan County has increased the scale of construction of edible mushroom production bases. By supporting leading enterprises, it has built a 2,000-mu factory-based edible mushroom production base mainly of button mushrooms, seafood mushrooms and king oyster mushrooms in the edible mushroom factory production demonstration park. By supporting the supporting facility levels of spawn plants, culture material fermentation yards and mushroom stick yards of enterprises such as Gansu Aifu and Shandan Jinzunyuan, it has improved the supply capacity of raw materials for edible mushroom cultivation, striving to reach an annual output of 5 million bags of various edible mushroom cultivation spawn, 100,000 tons of straw-rotting fungus culture material, and 25 million sticks of wood-rotting fungus.