Kon Tum (VNA) - Forty-three-year-old Le Ngoc Khanh from Dak Hrinhcommune in the Central Highlands province of Kon Tum quit his stable jobas a teacher at a vocational school and started growing mushrooms in 2014.

Being a novice in the business, Khanh enrolledin a training course to learn how to overcome the challenges. He now owns a6,000-square-metre mushroom farm that yields tonnes each year. 

In 1998, after serving in the army, Khanhmarried and studied at the construction college in Hanoi. After finishing hisstudy, he returned to his hometown and worked as teacher in Dak Ha district andthen a vocational training school.

“The hard training in the army helped me toacquire independence, self-discipline and become more tolerant of thechallenges in life,” said Khanh.

In 2010, he visited some households expertlygrowing lingzhi mushrooms in Cu Chi district in HCM City. Khanh found lingzhicould bring high economic benefits and began to nurture a dream of growingthem.

In 2012, he visited a lingzhi mushroom farm runby a woman in Krong A Na district in Kon Tum. Khanh then quit his job topursue mushroom growing. Yet it was not easy. Most of his friends opposed hisdecision, but he was so determined that he joined a four-month course thatoffered knowledge and skills in growing the fungus in the Krong A Na vocationaltraining centre.

During the course, he also travelled to otherlocalities, including Phu Yen and Quang Nam, to learn more.

Khanh then started growing lingzhi athome. Khanh and other former soldiers also set up an agriculture, tradeand service cooperative.  

“The cooperative was where the soldiersexchanged knowledge on working life, offering their skills to local people. Byestablishing a cooperative, it is easier to call for investment from localsmall business,” said Khanh.

Khanh hired four workers, the children of co-opmembers to work on his farm. They learned and worked for a monthly income of3.5 million VND (55 USD).

Khanh opened his first lingzhi farm in 2014,which covered 100sq.m and grew four types of mushrooms – lingzhi (Ganodermalucidum), wood ear (Auricularia auricula-judae), oyster mushroom (Pleurotusostreatus), and straw mushroom (Volvariella volvacea).

Initially he suffered a big loss as only 300packages of mushrooms were of high quality to sell.

“I still persisted with the project and decidedto stay on the farm to identify the reason for the failure,” said Khanh.

With patience and persistence, by late 2015,Khanh was able to sell 250kg of wood-ear mushroom for 23 million VND (1,000USD), 150kg of lingzhi for 80 million VND (3,500 USD), and 5.6 tonnes of oystermushrooms for 100 million VND (4,400 USD).  

With more than 200 million VND (8,800 USD) fromthe sale of mushrooms, Khanh paid off his loans and invested in the next batch.

In 2016, things went more smoothly. Khanh made amachine to keep the mushrooms warm. He also made a mixture of chilli, garlicand lemongrass to sterilise the farm.

Early 2017, he broadened the farm to 9,000sq.m.Khanh invented almost all the farm machinery and equipment himself.

Currently, his mushrooms are distributed inseveral supermarkets in Kon Tum, Phu Yen, Da Nang, and HCM City.

Khanh also sells mushroom at the embryonic stagefor those who want to grow mushroom by themselves - and shares hisknowledge with locals in Kon Tum and Phu Yen provinces.

“Now my hard work has paid off. I am so happy.Mushrooms are such a passion,” said Khanh.

In 2016, sales of mushrooms reached 600 millionVND (27,000 USD) with profit of 150 million VND (6,600 USD). In the first 10months of this year, Khanh earned 1 billion VND (44,300 USD) in saleswith profit of 250 million VND (11,000 USD).

"Khanh’s farm is an exemplary model in thecommune. The local authority encourages production to expand so that it canprovide more jobs for local people,” said Dang The Quyet, chairman of Dak Hrinhcommune’s People’s Committee.

Nowadays, mushroom cultivation is beingencouraged in Vietnam as it not only produces clean and healthy food, butcreates jobs and reduces environmental pollution.-VNA