The Jiarun Agriculture Cooperative in Shixian Village, Shiqiao Town, Jiahe County has been developing black fungus planting based on local resources.

In the planting base, rows of fungus sticks are neatly arranged in the ground, and the black fungi grow well, while workers are busy packaging in the workshop.

Luo Baihua, head of the cooperative, said that there are 12 mu (0.8 hectares) of black fungus for trial planting in Shixian Village and Xianrenqiao Village, and the output of per mu can reach 750 kg dried fungus. Compared with other kinds of fungus, their fungus tastes good with thicker texture.

In 2021, Shixian Village introduced Jiarun Agriculture Cooperative in the mode of “cooperative+village collective+farmers”, and promoted large-scale planting of organic crops with high quality, yield and benefit. For farmers, their incomes come not only from planting, but also from dividends of collective shares, sales rebates and product added-value profits. The village also implements guaranteed price purchase to protect farmers’ interests.

“This black fungus base brings 30,000 to 100,000 yuan of income to the village every year,” said Li Sijie, party secretary of the village.

Up to now, six towns and villages in the county have reached cooperation intention with Jiarun Agricultural Cooperative. It is expected that in 2022, the cultivation scale of black fungus in Shixian will expand to about 500 mu (about 33.3 hectares), with an annual output of 750 tons, bringing about 250,000-500,000 yuan of annual collective income for Shixian Village.