Photos of an entrepreneur - leaf mushroom farmer

Today was another field day which was great. We went out of Kathmandu to the field
office of WCS and picked up two young looking field agents. They had been working
there for 10 years which was hard to believe because they looked like they were 20 but
were 30.  Some people I meet (since I ask participants age) look so much older than they
really are.  A 42 year old may look well over 50.  

We did an interview with the woman pictured below and I was continually amazed at
what she had to say, and also how she said it. She spoke with great confidence.  The rest
of the interviews were interesting for other reasons. The other 3 women we met farmed on
really hilly terrain but each had either alternate forms of income or a husband with a salaried
job (government etc) but nevertheless, they each described a few month stretch where they
had trouble 'paying the bills' so to speak. 

I'll be able to meet more of the women involved in the WCS training when I return to
Kathmandu in a week. The trainings are scheduled for 'after Diwali (Tihar) which is based
on the moon phases so basically every time I ask about it, training is happening in 9 or 10
days. There's so many festivals here I have no idea how anything gets done :)

Mushrooms are grown in these bamboo and plastic houses.  The cost of hay, bamboo, rope, plastic, and labour
are significant so the famers recently have been doing training to learn about production then taking out loans
to get going on their own mushroom operation. During Dashain, 1 kg was going of around 1200 rupee, and in the non holiday season they go for around 100-200 rupee which was today's market retail price, 150 rupee.

This lady worked primarily on her own and hires in male labour to help her get everything done. She is like a kingpin in her village, and has been asked to attend many of the different training sessions so she can share her knowledge. She was asking about more advanced training, but the director wants her to be an instructor for the training instead.

These are leaf mushrooms, they grow out of bags of fermenting hay. The bags from my understanding are a one time use and getting good seed and the hay to grow in are the highest ongoing costs.

'shrooms.

This is her village. The woman has her own vehicle which is really not that common for smallholder farmers and is an indication of her success.

Here she is explaining how she knows she is getting good seed. With mushroom, the seed should be white, and the bad stuff is brown. Again, the different between good see and bad is about 5 months of growing.

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