Functional Area of Mushroom Cultivation

2. Functional Areas of Mushroom Cultivation as
an Enterprise
Prof. Dr. Munir Khan Khattak
Dept. of Agricultural & Applied Economics
The University of Agriculture, Peshawar

3. ENTERPRIZE
An organization that combines scarce resources
for the production and supply of goods and
services. The term enterprise is generally used
synonymously with other terms such as
business, firm, company and agriculture farm.
Mushroom is an economically profitable and
promising agricultural enterprise. Usually,
small, marginal and landless farmers are
engaged in mushroom cultivation mainly
because small piece of land, and little
amount of money are required as capital.

4. Factors of Production or Resources
• Factors of production refer to an economic term to
describe the inputs that are used in the production
of goods or services in the attempt to make profit.
The factors of production include:
• land,
• labor,
• Capital
• Organization
Organization (enterprise, brings all the previous
resources together for production).

5. Functional Area of Mushroom Production in
Pakistan
• Entrepreneurial skills are required if growers
intend their cultivation activities to go beyond
subsistence and local trade, and wish to develop
a small business.
• These may include basic bookkeeping skills,
planning and administration, management,
supplies of materials, management and
coordination of packaging and transport, and
negotiation skills and marketing.

6. Functional Area of Mushroom Production in
Pakistan
• Mushroom cultivation in Pakistan is in its teething
stage. Nature has gifted Pakistan with variety of
environmental conditions suitable for their cultivation
from sea level to high mountains, where different
types can easily be grown round the year.
• Mushroom is grown in Balochistan, Sindh, Punjab and
Khyber Pakhtoonkhawa, especially in mountainous
Swat valley and Murree hilly areas. These areas are
suitable for growing white button mushroom. A
khumbi mushroom is very common in the rural areas
of Sindh, a white umbrella type known as is also
consumed by the local inhabitants of Balochistan,
Sindh and the Punjab.

7. Functional Area of Mushroom Production in
Pakistan
• In Pakistan, mushroom cultivation has not been
given due importance, because of many reasons;
whereas, the nature has gifted favorable
environmental conditions with a huge quantity of
waste material required for obtaining beneficial
food and efficient medicine through artificial
cultivation of straw mushroom. No doubt, the
most easy and economical mushroom cultivation
technology is also developed by the scientists but
still the nation is consuming/ depending only up
on the mushroom grown naturally.

8. Functional Area of Mushroom Production in
Pakistan
• Land and climate play a minimal role in
mushroom cultivation and this feature makes
the enterprise particularly suitable for
farmers with limited land, as well as the
landless.
• Unlike wild harvested fungi, grown
mushrooms are not subject to any ecological
uncertainties including habitat health, nor
years of unpredictable production as a result
of late or reduced rains.

9. Functional Area of Mushroom Production in
Pakistan
• Access to sufficient, suitable and locally-
sourced substrate and spores are key
determinants as to whether mushroom
cultivation is likely to be successful and
sustainable or not.
• Both rural farmers and peri-urban cultivators
should be able to obtain agricultural by-
products easily and cheaply.

10. Functional Area of Mushroom Production in
Pakistan
• Mushroom spores can be collected from
mature fruiting bodies, but are commonly
purchased from local production facilities or
laboratories.
• Mushroom cultivation is compatible with
other farming and horticultural activities. It
can be regarded as a very efficient system in
recycling with no waste from production to
consumption.

11. Functional Area of Mushroom Production in
Pakistan
• As a result of the high perishability of
mushrooms, it can be of great benefit, for
small-scale cultivators selling their crop, to be
organized with other growers and to share
transport costs, market contacts, etc.
• In addition, working in collaboration with other
growers may enable cultivators to establish
local production, processing, or packaging
facilities to increase harvest output or product
shelf life i.e. a drying facility.

12. Functional Area of Mushroom Production in
Pakistan
• Mushroom cultivation represents a very
suitable and empowering income generating
option for women in particular, because it
can be combined with traditional domestic
duties and can be undertaken at home.
• Several programmes related to rural
mushroom production have given women the
opportunity to gain financial independence,
farming skills and higher self-esteem.

13. • Functional Area of Mushroom Production in
Pakistan
• Mushrooms are labour intensive and can be
undertaken as an additional livelihood activity
which fits around other household or productive
tasks.
• People with physical disabilities are fully capable
of accomplishing all necessary tasks in
mushroom cultivation, even if some
modifications in construction, equipment and
tasks are required.

14. • Mushroom cultivation is attractive for the resource-
poor for two reasons. Firstly, because mushroom
cultivation can be done on any scale, the initial
financial outlay to establish a basic cultivation system
need not be very great, and substrate materials are
often free.
• An example from Thailand illustrates the point: a
mushroom house large enough to hold 1000
mushroom bags can be built for less than US$15,
utilising the materials available locally.
• Secondly, compared to many agricultural and
horticultural crops, mushroom production systems
have a short turn around; a harvestable crop can be
produced and sold within two to four months, which
is very helpful for small-scale producers.

15. • Mushroom production is planned under
natural conditions. One important factor is
prevailing climatic condition (cold climate) in
the area where the mushroom farm will be
established economically. The different
mushroom that can be cultivated artificially
have different temperature requirement for
growing and fruiting. To obtain the good
quality mushroom light, temperature, and
humidity must be carefully controlled.

16. • Another critical factor is the location of the
mushroom farm, one should consider the
distance between the farm and the place
where the substrate will be obtained, the
greater the distance the higher will be the cost
of transporting and hence higher the cost of
production.
• Success of mushroom farming depends on the
availability of markets. Skilled workers are
required for post-harvest handling, drying and
packing of the mushroom prior to market.

17. • The marketing of mushroom follows the
traditional distribution channel, through
middlemen or wholesalers at farm who identifies
potential buyers and negotiate price, or directly
to retailers in urban markets.
• The time and cost spent in transportation, from
farm to the retail shop, varies from area to area.
• The key factors in marketing are availability of
current market information, quality of
mushroom and supply & demand which will
determine the selling price.

18. • Fresh mushroom is marketed in the super
store of Karachi, Lahore and Islamabad. The
surplus produce is dried and canned which is
marketed to hotels, restaurants and bakers.
• The potential targeted markets for the
mushroom are the cold areas especially
northern hilly areas of Pakistan like Kashmir
Gilgit Swat Kaghan and Muree/ galiyat.

19. • PRODUCTION PROCESS FLOW
• The important channels of mushroom marketing
in the area are:
• (1) Mushroom grower Wholesaler/Commission
agent → Retailer→ Consumer,
• (2) Mushroom grower →Wholesaler/Commission
agent → Consumer,
• (3) Mushroom grower→ Retailer→ Consumer,
and
• (4) Mushroom grower→ Consumer.

20. Mushroom production and processing
Spawn production
Growing Mushroom
Packaging
Labeling
Transporting
Marketing
Compose preparation