School children in Delhi to grow mushroom for local eatery & preserving enviornment
By Riti, Section News
Posted on Wed Jul 02, 2008 at 03:11:14 AM EST
If all goes as planned, school children in the Capital will soon be growing mushroom for your local eatery and re-introducing you to the three most important concepts of preserving the environment - reduce, recycle and reuse.
Taking a "green break" from academics, children from over 10 Delhi schools have been doing mushroom farming and working towards setting up their herbal gardens in an effort to appreciate nature and learn early on about working towards preserving the environment.
"The latest programme is aimed at helping students understand their responsibility towards the planet and sensitise them about the need to preserve it by actively involving them in green activities. The State Environment Department is undertaking the project in collaboration with city schools to ensure maximum outreach," said State Environment Department Senior Scientist Officer B. C. Sabata. "We have met with some success as part of our innovative mushroom farming and herbal garden schemes. If all goes as planned, we will encourage students to think bigger and cultivate enough to ensure that a small business venture is made possible. The department will try and encourage the students engaged in mushroom farming to increase their yield and we will help them tie up with a small hotel/eatery to ensure that their products are used and have some market value. This we hope will also encourage the students in the future to work harder and promote more students to be part of the project. Students under the project are being advised and helped by senior scientists and teachers," added Dr. Sabata. The project was launched to ensure that the waste generated by the schools was used in a productive manner.
The co-ordinator for the training programme of mushroom cultivation, Geeta Arunachalam, said: "This was started as a pilot project last year where students were taught how to reuse waste in a productive manner. "
Source:The Hindu 2ndJuly2008.
