Two siblings in Persembe, Ordu, a city located in northern Turkey, have applied for a grant through the Young Grower Project, financed by the state for mushroom production in a greenhouse.
Their application was accepted and the siblings set up a mushroom greenhouse with an acreage of 1,000 square feet. Afterwards, they have set up another greenhouse of similar size and they grow around 5 tons of oyster mushrooms annually.
Grower Engin Kontas: “Everybody needs to chase their dreams, this is a very profitable business. There is a significant gap between demand and supply for this product. We do not have any problem with sales, we sell the products immediately when they are ready because there is such a big demand for this product. The price per kg at wholesale is around 1.80 USD, whereas at retail we sell it at 2.50 USD per kg. Our profit is around 1,000 USD per month.
We harvest products every 3 months and the harvested products are sold within the week. We can barely keep up with the demand for these mushrooms.”
Ordu Food, Agriculture and Livestock Director Kemal Yilmaz: “We have been working very hard to increase mushroom production in Ordu. In 2015, there was only one production facility, now there are 15 facilities with a total area of 20,000 square feet. You can harvest around 10 tons of products annually from a greenhouse of 1,000 square feet and we have grown around 150 tons in our city which we have sold very easily. This shows that there is a huge demand for this product in the market.”
Source: AA