Why are travel & tourism workers growing mushrooms in rural Sri Lanka?

Susan Eardly and Dinesh Pathir­ana are empower­ing rur­al Sri Lankan fam­il­ies pre­vi­ously reli­ant on tour­ism income to devel­op sus­tain­able busi­nesses. In this “Good Tour­ism” Insight, Ms Eardly dis­cusses funguses and answers the ques­tion: “Why fungi?” 

(Thanks to “GT” Friend Richard Shep­ard for the introduction.)

Sri Lanka, the trop­ic­al island set like a pearl in the Indi­an Ocean just off the coast of India, with its scen­ic tea plant­a­tions and absorb­ing cul­tur­al her­it­age sites … Sri Lanka, the nature-lover’s para­dise of beau­ti­ful sandy beaches, wild­life, and water­falls … Even Sri Lanka could not escape the COVID-19 pandemic. 

The coronavir­us has dis­rup­ted the whole eco­nom­ic, social, and envir­on­ment­al eco­sys­tem of the island, and has deeply impacted live­li­hoods in rur­al areas, par­tic­u­larly those dir­ectly or indir­ectly reli­ant on the travel & tour­ism industry.

At Serene Vaca­tions, we decided to work togeth­er as a team to sup­port the most affected in the rur­al tour­ism sec­tor. We wanted to find ways to mit­ig­ate the worst eco­nom­ic effects of COVID and cre­ate new oppor­tun­it­ies that could carry on long after the crisis. We aimed to cre­ate new rur­al entre­pren­eurs through pro­jects that would gen­er­ate sus­tain­able income and cre­ate new jobs for rur­al fam­il­ies; those who had been work­ing in the tour­ism sec­tor but who have since lost their jobs and income fol­low­ing the 2019 East­er attacks and now the COVID-19 pandemic.

Why fungi?

Bey­ond improv­ing the imme­di­ate eco­nom­ic con­di­tions for those most affected, we also aimed to improve the over­all nutri­tion­al status of the com­munity to help it thrive in the long-term, while min­im­ising any impact on the nat­ur­al envir­on­ment. That’s why we hit upon mushrooms!

As we know, mush­rooms are a veget­able and their pro­duc­tion can be a prof­it­able eco-friendly agribusi­ness. Mush­rooms have received increased atten­tion in recent years because of their medi­cin­al bene­fits. As per the BBC and oth­ers (The Mush­room Coun­cil; Med­ic­al News Today), mush­rooms con­tain a sig­ni­fic­ant amount of diet­ary fiber, pro­tein, amino acids, vit­am­ins (includ­ing B1, B2, B12, C, D, and E), and min­er­als. Mush­rooms are low in fat and cal­or­ies and are a good immune boost­er with can­cer-fight­ing properties.

As a live­li­hood diver­si­fic­a­tion option, mush­room cul­tiv­a­tion has enorm­ous poten­tial to improve food secur­ity and income gen­er­a­tion, which in turn can help boost rur­al and urb­an sus­tain­able eco­nom­ic growth. 

Mush­room cul­tiv­a­tion in Sri Lanka is scattered around the coun­try. It is mostly done at the house­hold level as a small busi­ness. Des­pite demand for good qual­ity mush­rooms in Sri Lanka, cul­tiv­at­ors have failed to meet that demand and/or the required qual­ity stand­ards due to lack of fin­ances, know­ledge, and support. 

Our pro­ject aims to improve loc­al sup­plies of mush­rooms for vil­lage house­holds, res­taur­ants, hotels, and super­mar­kets. To that end we aim to cre­ate small farm­er entre­pren­eurs in each dis­trict of the coun­try cap­able of sat­is­fy­ing loc­al demand. To help them along, we intend to address the social, envir­on­ment­al, and eco­nom­ic chal­lenges faced by rur­al fam­il­ies by work­ing closely with them and oth­er stakeholders.

Once estab­lished, the entire mush­room pro­duc­tion cycle takes approx­im­ately 15 weeks, from the start of com­post­ing to the final “steam­ing off” after har­vest­ing. A mush­room grow­er can expect up to 4 lbs (a little under 2 kgs) of product per square foot. The final yield depends on how well a grow­er has mon­itored and con­trolled tem­per­at­ure, humid­ity, pests, and so on.

Objectives

• Cre­ate new jobs and gen­er­ate income for those whose live­li­hoods were too depend­ent on tourism
• Sup­ply chain development
• Intro­duce innov­at­ive tech­no­logy to reduce pro­duc­tion costs, increase yields, and improve quality
• In the long term, cre­ate export-ori­ented products through bot­tling and drying
• Empower women by giv­ing them lead­er­ship roles in rur­al communities
• Alle­vi­ate waste accu­mu­la­tion through mush­room com­post­ing methods

The income gen­er­ated will bene­fit fam­il­ies, com­munit­ies, and the country’s eco­nomy. We intend to imple­ment smart farm­ing solu­tions and improve value chains so that farm­ers will reap long-term com­mer­cial benefits.

Expected benefits

• For pro­du­cers: With the intro­duc­tion of new tech­no­logy, fin­an­cial sup­port, and advanced train­ing, farm­ers will pro­duce a high qual­ity product at lower cost, mak­ing the product attract­ive to hotels, shops, and oth­er buy­ers. We will also help them expand their mar­kets as they increase production.
• For con­sumers: Con­sumers will have the oppor­tun­ity to buy high qual­ity and nutri­tious mush­rooms for lower prices.
• For the eco­nomy: Live­li­hood enhance­ment; sus­tain­able eco­nom­ic growth; and oppor­tun­it­ies to reach glob­al mar­kets through exports.

Through inclus­ive busi­ness prac­tices we plan to cre­ate oppor­tun­it­ies for skills devel­op­ment, increase the num­ber of women-owned and oper­ated busi­nesses, imple­ment flex­ible work prac­tices, and respond to envir­on­ment­al impacts.

Who has benefitted so far?

Christo from Sigiriya

Sigir­iya is part of the cul­tur­al tri­angle in Sri Lanka. Christo is a tour­ist driver who lost his job after the 2019 East­er attacks. The 44-year-old needs to sup­port his fam­ily, includ­ing his wife, child, and moth­er. But his abil­ity to do that still depends upon a volat­ile and unre­li­able tour­ism-derived income. So Christo star­ted cul­tiv­at­ing mush­rooms in Septem­ber 2020 and has just star­ted harvesting.

Janaka and Lemani from Habarana

Habarana vil­lage adjoins a wild­life sanc­tu­ary near Sigir­iya where 42-year old Jana­ka is a safari ser­vice pro­vider. He has more than 15 years’ exper­i­ence tak­ing trav­el­lers to see wild­life. An avid nature lov­er, Jana­ka adored his jungle job. But then tour­ism vanished.

Jana­ka and his wife Lemani plan to grow mush­rooms to sup­ply nearby res­taur­ants and hotels. Their income from this new ven­ture will sup­port their two young sons, allow­ing them to attend school on a reg­u­lar basis. It will also give them an oppor­tun­ity to sup­port Jana­ka’s fath­er who grows veget­ables and rice.

With our sup­port, Jana­ka star­ted build­ing two mush­room grow­ing rooms in late Octo­ber. Accord­ing to loc­al tra­di­tion, he selec­ted the most aus­pi­cious time to start — exactly 7:28 in the morn­ing — and fol­lowed his reli­gious tra­di­tions, offer­ing thanks to the nature gods.

Sudath from Kurunegala

Our third mush­room entre­pren­eur is 39-year old Sudath. Sudath was a man­ager in a beau­ti­ful villa loc­ated in Wilp­attu, a wild­life sanc­tu­ary in north­ern Sri Lanka … until he lost his job in August. He has two little daugh­ters who attend school. Sudath has taken gov­ern­ment train­ing courses on mush­room cul­tiv­a­tion, selec­ted a loc­a­tion to start, and is now look­ing for the funds to begin con­struc­tion of cul­tiv­a­tion rooms. Sudath plans to first sell his mush­rooms to house­holds in his vil­lage, and later to nearby restaurants.

Asanka from Matale

Matale in cent­ral Sri Lanka, near Kandy, is famed for its spices. Formerly a tour­ism driver in the area, Asanga has a two-year old daugh­ter. His wife works for the gov­ern­ment postal service.

Hav­ing com­pleted his train­ing in grow­ing mush­rooms, the 34-year-old decided he would be bet­ter suited to selling and dis­trib­ut­ing them. Asanga has planned a col­lec­tion cen­ter for loc­ally-grown mush­rooms and hopes to sup­ply hotels. He now needs funds to build the col­lec­tion cen­ter and acquire a deliv­ery vehicle. 

Awaiting training in Tissamaharama

We have very recently iden­ti­fied three oth­er bud­ding entre­pren­eurs keen to enter the mush­room busi­ness. They are all from Tis­sama­ha­rama in south­ern Sri Lanka (near Yala Nation­al Park), they all have depend­ents, and they all await train­ing that will help them sur­vive the COV­ID-induced tour­ism crisis now and help them with anoth­er source of income in future: Sus­antha, 48, a wild­life guide; Chandrasiri, 62, who is also a wild­life guide; and Chandare, 39, a fish­ing guide.

What support is needed to continue?

Like everything else, we plan to con­tin­ue our work as we raise funds. Each mush­room pro­ject needs about USD2,000 to com­plete con­struc­tion and start up. The new farm­ers also need tech­nic­al and train­ing sup­port in mush­room cul­tiv­a­tion and pro­cesses. The tech­nic­al guid­ance and sup­port, which we organ­ise, will be of enorm­ous bene­fit to the major­ity of mush­room grow­ers, par­tic­u­larly at the ini­tial stages of cul­tiv­a­tion. For many, this is a new ven­ture, but even for those who have the basic know­ledge, many tech­nic­al terms and pro­ced­ures for sus­tain­able mush­room cul­tiv­a­tion are unfamiliar.

So, we are fin­an­cing the pro­ject through indi­vidu­al con­tri­bu­tions and donor organ­isa­tions, and we rely on volun­teers, but of course we will need addi­tion­al help to make this pro­ject a suc­cess. By spread­ing the word on how we are com­bat­ing the effects of the pan­dem­ic, and cre­at­ing new oppor­tun­it­ies to replace those that have been lost in the travel sec­tor, we hope to provide some inspir­a­tion and, of course, attract addi­tion­al fin­an­cial help. We aim to uplift rur­al fam­il­ies and have no expect­a­tion of com­mer­cial returns for Serene Vacations.

What do you think? Share a short anec­dote or com­ment below. Or write a deep­er “GT” Insight. The “Good Tour­ism” Blog wel­comes diversity of opin­ion and per­spect­ive about travel & tour­ism because travel & tour­ism is everyone’s business.

Fea­tured image (top of post): Oyster mush­room abstrac­tion. Image (CC0) via Pikrepo.

About the author

Susan Eardly (email) is a tour­ism entre­pren­eur in Sri Lanka, hav­ing foun­ded Serene Vaca­tions, a travel agency, with her hus­band Dinesh Pathir­ana. With a Mas­ter­’s in Busi­ness Man­age­ment, Susan has been a pas­sion­ate play­er in the tour­ism industry since 2004, and has developed an extens­ive inter­na­tion­al net­work of busi­ness con­tacts through her travels. 

She believes travel & tour­ism is “more about interest and cre­ativ­ity, and help­ing trav­el­lers get their best exper­i­ence; not only about invest­ment and rev­en­ue”. She adds: “I believe that suc­cess depends on the abil­ity to think stra­tegic­ally and to believe in pos­sib­il­it­ies. SUCCESS is all about tak­ing action for your dreams.”

Thanks to “GT” Friend Richard Shep­ard for the introduction.