Santpali village in Basna block, located 114 km away from Mahasamund District of Chhattisgarh. Village is connected on both sides by main roads. The total population of the village is 1644. It is a tribal village in which most of the people belong to the Gond and Gada community. In this village, Mrs. Amarbai resides with her husband Balaram and two children. Amarbai comes from a very poor family , they are dependent on agriculture to eke a living. Her family has only 80 decimals of land in which they have home and a small farm. They eat vegetables from their farm. For other needs they work as laborers in other people’s farms.the sake of living and raising children, they do wages and take lease lands for cultivation.
Samerth started working in Basna block in 2020 in areas of nutrition, livelihood, agriculture, natural resource management, climate change prevention etc. Several training/meeting exposures were organised on organic farming, kitchen gardening, mushroom farming, livelihood, nutrition etc. The mushroom production training did not strike a cord initially with Amarbai, but a visit to the mushroom production centre changed it, and she became enthusiastic to start it.
After that started Amarbai participating in many training/meetings in her efforts to produce mushrooms. She brought a packet of para mushroom seeds of 40 rupees and planted it. At first, she was very hesitant and unsure if it will be successful. But in a weeks time small mushrooms started growing out of them. The half kilograms of mushrooms produced in first 12 days were consumed by her family. She could sell a first produce of half a kg in the market after a few days. The price of mushroom is currently 250-300 rupees per kg. A total of 2 to 3 kg mushrooms were produced, and she was very happy.
Encouraged, she bought 10 packets of mushroom seeds of 400 rupees and planted it following the complete production method. Amarbai now has developed a good understanding on the whole process of mushroom production. Earlier Amarbai used to produce mushrooms alone and now she is selling it with the help of her husband Balaram. Now the family eats them regularly, increasing their nutrition quotient as well as earning extra income.
It was very challenging at first, Amarbai took a long time to understand the method of production. Samerth team members had to explain her again and again, then she agreed to produce. However, she was very hesitant but now she has done very well. Now she is motivating people to produce mushrooms by telling them complete method of production. After seeing them 8 more people inspired and started production after taking information from them.
