In the Bogor district, on the Indonesian island of Java, small scale production of oyster mushrooms is being undertaken by some members of the Women Farmers Group ‘Hanjuang’. In the scope of PUM Senior Experts the author has visited and advised this group on their Oyster mushroom cultivation activities.

The Women Farmers Group Hanjuang has been started in 1985 by the chairman Mrs Enjah Hodijah. The aim is to set up small scale activities for housewives to enable them to earn an additional income for the family in their free time. The activities undertaken are production of ornamental plants, nurseries for seedlings of trees and medicinal plants, chicken breeding, home industries as making emping, mushroom chips, woodcarving and also production of oyster mushrooms.

The group started has now 125 members. Mushroom cultivation is being undertaken by eight.

Hanjuang has contact with similar groups throughout the country and is also involved in social activities. It received a FAO reward and an award of the Indonesian president in 1999. The government is stimulating initiatives to set up groups like these by assisting on organisational aspects and giving some elementary training.

Mushroom cultivation

In Bogor, just South of Jakarta, mushrooms are cultivated on a substrate prepared from sawdust. Most of the time this sawdust comes from the local timber tree Abizia or Jeunjing. Good quality is available throughout most of the year and only rarely other sawdust from fuittrees as Doerian or Rambuttan has to be used.

The mushroom predominantly grown is Pleurotus ostreatus var. florida, although sporadically other Pleurotus species as cystidiosus , sajor caju and flabellatus are grown.

Other mushroom species grown - but to a far lesser extend - are shiitake (Lentinula edodes), yudae ear mushroom and black wood ear mushroom (Auricularia spp.) and on a larger distance of Bogor the rice straw mushroom (Volvariella volvacea). Incidently Ganoderma spp are being grown too.

Spawn and substrate

Nearly all grower groups and companies in Indonesia are making their own spawn. Mrs Enjah is producing the spawn for her group as well, as on request for other growers in the country.

The first step is to make a tissue culture from a well looking mushroom on PDA agar. From the best growing plates an inoculation on a bottle with sterilized enriched sawdust substrate will be made. From the well growing bottles other bottles or bags will be inoculated once more. Given the circumstances, the rate of contamination is rather low. First steps of improvement by getting a decent autoclave and a good incubator have been set. Further adaptations of the lab facilities will be taken.

The reason for the use of a wood sawdust substrate is that it is abundantly available throughout the year against low costs. Rice straw in this district is scarce and not available year round.

The basic recipe for the substrate is mixing 10 kilogram of wooddust with 1,5 kilogram of well grinded rice bran, 200 gram of lime, 20 gram of gypsum and adding 15 litres of water, depending on the moisture content of the sawdust. Some other growers visited are adding other ingredients like maizena, vitamin B etcetera but the Hanjuang group is using the basic formula.

The mixed ingredients are being put in 2 litre polybags and pressed to so called bag logs of 1.2 kilogram. The top opening, made with a pvc ring, is closed with a cottonwool plug. These bag logs are put on platforms above water in drums and after closing the drums with burners the steaming or pasteurisation starts. Many problems occurring later can be related to this part of the process. Often the pasteurisation period is far too short.

After pasteurisation and cooling down the bag logs are spawned by putting spawn in the top opening and closed again with the cottonwool plug.

Growing and marketing

After spawning the bag logs are placed in incubation rooms for four weeks and when they are well grown they are placed on bamboo shelves in the growing units. The construction of the growing units (average floor space 35 m²) is rather primitive, made of palmleave mats on a skeleton of bamboo poles. Roofing is of tiles or mats. Concrete floors are rare and therefore water cannot be used for cleaning.

Having been placed in the growing unit, the cottonwool plugs of the bag logs are removed. After a few days the first fruiting bodies appear.

Watering is being done manually twice a day except for extreme wet conditions only once a day. Concerning farm hygiene, many steps forward can be taken. Removal of spent substrate and contaminated bag logs from the growing units for example.

When the mushroom clusters are large enough they will be picked and just sold as a cluster. Harvesting will be done over a minimum period of three weeks but most of the time up till eight weeks. Although record keeping is not common, it is claimed that yields are 20 - 25%.

At present the mushrooms are put in plastic bags to be transported to the market. Some improvements on this, by putting them in cartons to avoid bruising, are implemented. 

The mushrooms produced by Hanjuang are being sold to a market trader for a stable price of 6000 Rp per kilogram. The advantage of selling to this trader is that payment is being received immediately, whereas by selling to supermarkets payments will be received only after some weeks. There is quite a demand for mushrooms at the local markets and some traders would like to be able to have triple the present amount.

The few larger mushroom production companies are selling to supermarkets or are trying to export. Actually to advise companies and groups for export is not very useful, due to the heavy competition on the world market.

Income and social Impact

Costs of the growing units are low, at about € 100 per unit of 35m² floor space, an expensive investment for many Indonesians. To have a concrete floor in the growing unit and make the units insect proof will raise the investment considerably. On the other hand, the net income of such a mushroom cultivation unit at present is about € 1500 per year and will increase with a better construction, enabling a better farm hygiene.

The additional family income is often used to pay the relative high school fees for the children. In this respect these activities have quite a social impact. Furthermore a waste product as sawdust is being used for substrate whereas often this sawdust is being burned, thus adding to the pollution problem.

The Hanjuang mushroom farms are also being used to train students of the Agricultural Extension Highschool in Bogor. About ten mainly elderly students from various regions of Java and some other islands are having this practical training of a few months. The slogan ‘learning by doing’ is also known over here!

Upgrading

A start has been made to upgrade methods and constructions step by step. Through assistance of the Agricultural Counsellor Mr Frans Claassen of the Netherlands Embassy, the Hanjuang Group applied for assistance of PUM, which was granted.

Next to that it became clear that Hanjuang was a perfect target group for the gifts donated to Mr Jan Pijnenborg on his retirement of the Dutch CNC. He dedicated these gifts to be used for assisting cooperative mushroom growers in Indonesia. These will be used to upgrade the spawn production facilities for which an autoclave and incubator already have been purchased.

Because the mushroom growers of Hanjuang are also training students who will be able to spread there knowledge throughout Indonesia, a gift from the Hans Blankert Fonds of PUM will be used to make the growing units insect proof and put concrete floors in the units. In addition, a standard demonstration/training unit will be constructed which can be used in other regions for similar groups.

PUM

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