Industrialized edible mushroom farming helps impoverished farmer Wu Piyu get rich

Corn fields turned into shiitake mushroom greenhouses, shovels swapped for remote controls

Wu Piyu, a villager of Liangjiagou Village, Shuangchi Town, Jiaokou County, used to grow corn, earning just over 5,000 yuan a year from 12 mu of land. Now he runs an edible mushroom greenhouse that the village committee built uniformly for impoverished households. One greenhouse covers five or six fen of land and is used to cultivate shiitake mushrooms, and the first flush alone brought in more than 10,000 yuan. On November 3, Wu Piyu, who was about to harvest the second flush, said happily: "You can make money doing this."

Wu Piyu is 43 this year. He is disabled by illness, and his wife is also ill. Two children are in school. Because his father died early, he also supports his mother, his younger sister who is attending university, and his disadvantaged younger brother's family of three. His family has 12 mu of land, 4 mu of which is hillside. In previous years, growing corn brought in just over 5,000 yuan. The village helped him buy a rotary tiller to plow land for villagers, bringing in another four or five thousand yuan a year. All this income barely kept the whole family fed and clothed.

In response to the reality that traditional agriculture depends on the weather and impoverished households lack skills, making it hard for them to escape poverty, last winter Liangjiagou Village answered the county's call and used an industrialized approach to develop a sunrise industry - edible mushrooms - hoping to solve the poverty problem of 40 impoverished households. The village transferred 80 mu of farmers' farmland at a cost of 150% of output. Village Party branch secretary Liang Junming personally put up 300,000 yuan, the masses raised part of the funds, and the construction team advanced part of the funds, for a total investment of 1.46 million yuan to build the first phase of 30 greenhouses, giving priority to each impoverished household to operate one. The village invited technicians from Pingquan County, Hebei Province, to give technical lectures, and spent 5,000 yuan a month to hire technicians from Baoding City, Hebei Province, for on-site guidance. Liang Junming himself went to Taiyuan City, Zhengzhou City and other places to promote the products, and recently even secured a project with Minsheng Bank to bring agricultural products into residential communities, advertising the village's edible mushrooms for free.

After transferring his family's 8 mu of corn land to the village collective last winter, Wu Piyu put down his shovel, walked into the greenhouse and devoted himself to shiitake mushrooms. He never missed any technical training, whether in the town or the village, and after returning home he would read books over and over again, calling technicians inside and outside the province whenever he did not understand something. He also raised more than 20,000 yuan in financing to improve the facilities, especially adding modern atomizing pumps. More than a month ago, his efforts paid off: the first flush of shiitake mushrooms in one greenhouse matured and sold for more than 10,000 yuan. He said: one batch has four flushes over a one-year cycle, and it should bring in at least 30,000 yuan.

Seeing that Wu Piyu managed the greenhouse quite well, some time ago Liang Junming put up 3,000 yuan to contract another household's greenhouse over to Wu Piyu, and now the second greenhouse is almost ready to produce mushrooms. Liang Junming said: "This man is serious. I support him and I have confidence in him!"

Now, two greenhouses keep Wu Piyu even busier, so he asks his mother, his younger brother and his older brother, who lives on odd jobs, to help. But he does not use them for free; he pays each of them 1,500 to 1,600 yuan a month. On October 29, the reporter came to Liangjiagou Village. Row upon row of greenhouses stood at the entrance to the village like factory buildings. Wu Piyu pressed a button, and the automatic roller blind machine on his greenhouse rolled up the insulation curtain. Inside the greenhouse, shelves upon shelves and layers upon layers of shiitake mushrooms were vivid and fragrant, and fans, blowers, atomizing pumps, water pipes, electric button boxes and other equipment were neatly arranged, just like a workshop. Wu Piyu said proudly: "I was a farmer, and now I am the owner of a shiitake mushroom greenhouse, almost like a boss!"