Mongar’s first entrepreneur, a mushroom grower

Dec 24, 2020

With the government focusing more on rural enterprises, youths taking up entrepreneurial jobs in villages are also on the rise. In Mongar, 29-year-old Shacha Dorji from Tsakaling Gewog becomes the first entrepreneur in the dzongkhag. He owns a mushroom spawn production unit. 

Completing a bachelor’s degree from India in 2017, Shacha started with the enterprise last year. Today, he markets the spawn in Mongar, Lhuntse, and Samdrup Jongkhar dzongkhags. And with an increasing number of mushroom growers, he has no dearth of market.

He sold around 20 kilograms of spawn recently and earned about Nu. 3000. ”The return is not much now because the business is still in its initial stage,” said Shacha.

Besides spawn production, he also grows shitake and oyster. He sold over 50 kilograms of the mushrooms thus far and earned around Nu. 15,000.

Shacha said, ”after acquiring training from the Agriculture Research and Development Center, ARDC, at Khangma in Tashigang, I started growing the mushrooms from last year, owing to its demand in the market.” The center provided him all the required technical support in setting up the enterprise.

Meanwhile, an increasing number of youths across the country have been taking up mushroom cultivation in recent times.

Sonam Tshering