Chamoli girl Divya to get award for mushroom promotion in hills : The Tribune India

Join Whatsapp Channel

Chamoli girl Divya to get award for mushroom promotion in hills

DEHRADUN: Chamoli girl Divya Rawat will be conferred with the prestigious Progressive Mushroom Grower Award in the mushroom city of Solan in Himachal Pradesh on September 10.

Chamoli girl Divya to get award for mushroom promotion in hills

Divya Rawat shows mushrooms grown in her production units



Jotirmay Thapliyal

Tribune News Service

Dehradun, August 24

Chamoli girl Divya Rawat will be conferred with the prestigious Progressive Mushroom Grower Award in the mushroom city of Solan in Himachal Pradesh on September 10.

The Directorate of Mushroom Research, Solan, an apex body in the country in the field of mushroom research, has decide to bestow upon Divya the award taking into account her contribution to promotion of mushroom cultivation in Uttarakhand and thus helping in ensuring reverse migration in several of abandoned villages of Garhwal hills.

Divya belongs to Kot Kandara village in Chamoli district. She has been doing a yeoman service in promotion of mushroom cultivation in the state that too within a span of three years and six months. She has mushroom products both in Chamoli and Dehradun. Around 50 to 60 persons visit her Mothorowala residence in Dehradun to get first-hand knowledge of mushroom cultivation.

Divya is working with a team of 18 to 20 persons and has adopted all possible innovations to ensure that the production cost of mushroom is brought to minimum so as to increase the net profitability of growers. Divya is using bamboo racks instead of iron and aluminum racks and is growing a variety of mushrooms in accordance with the weather to cut costs.

“For a room of 15 ft wide and 15 ft long, Rs 1 lakh is needed to make iron racks mushroom cultivation and Rs 1.5 lakh is needed if these racks are of aluminum. But by using bamboos we can reduce the cost to mere Rs 15,000,” Divya says. Similarly, we can also reduce air-conditioning costs by growing a variety of mushroom, according to the prevailing weather conditions.

She says that with little infrastructure mushroom cultivation can yield encouraging results. Even at the wholesale rate, the most common button mushroom fetches around Rs 80 to Rs 100 per kg.

Divya is a graduate in social work from Amity College, Noida. She believes that mushroom cultivation can help in checking migration from hilly villages and can also encourage reverse migration.

Divya has already helped in setting up 50,000 small mushroom growing units in Uttarakhand hills. She says mushroom cultivation, which can be taken up round the year, can prove to be an important source of livelihood in hills. She adds with high nutritive value, mushrooms are in great demand both in and outside Uttarakhand.

“At present most of the mushroom being consumed in Uttarakhand hills come from other states, thus amply revealing the scope of mushroom cultivation in the state,” Divya observes. She has set up Soumya Foods Private Limited, a company through which she is also ensuring proper marketing of mushroom grown by villagers.

Top News

Delhi High Court dismisses PIL to remove Arvind Kejriwal from CM post after arrest

Delhi High Court dismisses PIL to remove Arvind Kejriwal from CM post after arrest

The bench refuses to comment on merits of the issue, saying ...

US makes another remark on Kejriwal's arrest, reacts to freezing of Congress bank accounts

US makes another remark on Arvind Kejriwal's arrest, reacts to freezing of Congress bank accounts

We encourage fair, transparent and timely legal processes, s...

Explainer: Why BJP is flying solo in Punjab and Odisha

Explainer: Why BJP is flying solo in Punjab and Odisha

A multi-cornered contest is always advantageous for BJP; it ...


Cities

View All