80-year-old farmer launched a plant for the production of oyster mushrooms in Aksubayevsky area
The Ministry of Agriculture and Food of the Republic of Tatarstan pays great attention to the development of small and medium-sized businesses in the countryside. Today, in every district there are people who have opened their own business and successfully developed it. One of these is Anatoly Samarenkin, who opened a plant for the production of oyster mushrooms in his native village of Old Mokshino, Aksubayevsky district.
Spring just started but in the Aksubayevsky district they are already harvesting mushrooms. Despite his 80 years, Anatoly started farming only three years ago.
“I always had a soul of a fellow villager. And during the last visit to my homeland, I've been asked to open at least some production, so that the youth would be employed, so that the village would not die. And the choice fell on the mushroom shop, ”recalls Anatoly Konstantinovich.
The workshop was launched three years ago as an experimental one; there is no analogue in Tatarstan. First of all, the abandoned warehouses were restored, communications were carried out and equipment was delivered. The villagers wondered how mushrooms would grow out of plastic bags filled with substrates based on sunflower husks or straw. But they began to grow. Even the most pessimistic fellow villagers believed the peasant farm of Samarenkin. In those years, the total area of the mushroom shop was 350 square meters, and four workers worked on production.
The ministry supported the initiative of Anatoly Samarenkin, he was awarded grants for the purchase of equipment, technical modernization and construction of access roads in the amount of more than 5 million rubles.
Soon the second building was built. Its area was 1,450 square meters.
Mushrooms are grown in special chambers where certain temperatures, humidity and room ventilation are observed. Entry into the room is allowed only in shoe covers and bathrobes.
"Every month we get about two tons of oyster mushrooms," said Tatyana Zhukova, a mushroom cultivation operator. She has been working on the farm since the opening and knows all the subtleties. She told in detail about the work of the shop: how the mushrooms crumble and then dry in a special oven. They also produce mushroom flour.
As Anatoly Konstantinovich notes, cultivation of mushrooms is a costly task, as long as the blocks of mycelium are purchased outside of Tatarstan, one block lasts no more than three months. But this question will also be removed soon - it is planned to launch a workshop for the production of “myceliums”.