Mushrooms helping with food shortage in Syria
Abu Nabil walks between the sacks inspecting the clusters of mushrooms emerging from the plastic and checking the internal temperature to ensure conditions are optimal for the unusual crop.
Mushrooms are not a common crop in Syria, and rarely feature in local cuisine.
But in the Eastern Ghouta region, a key rebel bastion outside the capital Damascus, years of government siege have put traditional staples like meat far beyond the reach of ordinary people.
The Adala Foundation, a local NGO, began thinking about ways to help residents in need of nutritious alternatives.
"We turned to cultivating mushrooms because they're a food that has high nutritional value, similar to meat, and can be grown inside houses and basements," said Abu Nabil, an engineer who is project director.
"We were looking for a good source of proteins and mineral salts as an alternative to meat, which is very expensive," added Adala's director Muayad Mohieddin.
"We discovered the idea of mushrooms as a solution."
Eastern Ghouta has been under siege since 2013, leaving locals to rely on food produced locally or smuggled in through tunnels or across checkpoints.
While the area was once an important agricultural region for Syria, mushrooms were not a local crop.
The NGO discovered mushroom farming required neither large amounts of space, nor major financial investment, making it a good fit for their needs.
The project relies on generators to keep conditions steady at 25 degrees centigrade and 80 percent humidity. But with fuel also in short supply and expensive, the generators are fed with a locally produced fuel that is extracted from plastic.
In the three months since the project began, the NGO has distributed mushrooms across Douma and other parts of Eastern Ghouta free of charge.
"We distribute nearly 1,300 kilograms of mushrooms a week to 600 people," said Abu Nabil. "The distribution is free for the poorest families, and for those suffering malnutrition or spinal cord injuries that need lots of nutrients."
Source: sg.news.yahoo.com
