When we believe of mushrooms and the southern Mexico point out of Oaxaca, the first point which typically arrives to thoughts is María Sabina, Huautla de Jiménez and hallucinogenic “magic” mushrooms. But little by little that is all shifting as a outcome of the groundbreaking perform of Josefina Jiménez and Johann Mathieu in mycology, by means of their company, Mico-lógica.
Dependent in the village of Benito Juárez, found in Oaxaca’s Ixtlán district (more frequently known as the Sierra Norte, the state’s major ecotourism area), Mico-lógica’s mission is threefold: to train the two Mexicans and guests to the nation in the reduced-price cultivation of a variety of mushroom species to teach about the medicinal, nutritional and environmental (sustainable) benefit of mushrooms and to perform ongoing investigation concerning optimum climatic regions and the diversity of substrata for mushroom lifestyle.
The French-born Mathieu moved to Mexico, and in truth to Huautla de Jiménez, in 2005. “Indeed, coming all the way to Mexico from France to pursue my desire in mushrooms seems like a prolonged way to vacation,” Mathieu explained in a current interview in Oaxaca. “But there genuinely wasn’t considerably of an chance to perform reports and expand a company in Western Europe,” he carries on, “considering that reverence for mushrooms experienced been all but totally eradicated by The Church more than the training course of generations and I realized that Mexico even now maintains a regard and appreciation for the medicinal and dietary benefit of hongos. Mexico is considerably from mycophobic.”
Huautla de Jiménez is far more than a 5 hour push from the closest metropolitan center. Appropriately, Mathieu eventually realized that staying in Huautla, even though keeping an historic attract and getting in a geographic location conducive to functioning with mushrooms, would hinder his attempts to grow a organization and cultivate popular curiosity in studying about fungi. Mathieu turned cognizant of the burgeoning popularity of Oaxaca’s ecotourism communities of the Sierra Norte, and indeed the Feria Regional de Hongos Silvestres (regional wild mushroom pageant), held every year in Cuahimoloyas.
Mathieu satisfied Josefina Jiménez at the summertime weekend mushroom function. Jiménez experienced moved to Oaxaca from hometown Mexico City in 2002. The two shared related passions Jiménez had analyzed agronomy, and for close to a 10 years had been functioning with sustainable agriculture projects in rural farming communities in the Huasteca Potosina area of San Luis Potosí, the mountains of Guerrero and the coastline of Chiapas. Mathieu and Jiménez grew to become enterprise, and then existence companions in Benito Juárez.
Mathieu and Jiménez are concentrating on three mushroom species in their arms-on seminars oyster (seta), shitake and reishi. Their a single-working day workshops are for oyster mushrooms, and two-working day clinics for the latter two species of fungus. “With reishi, and to a lesser extent shitake, we are also instructing a fair bit about the medicinal uses of mushrooms, so more time is essential,” says Mathieu, “and with oyster mushrooms it is predominantly [but not solely] a training course on cultivation.”
While training seminars are now only presented in Benito Juárez, Mathieu and Jiménez prepare to broaden operations to include the two the central valleys and coastal locations of Oaxaca. The item is to have a community of producers developing various mushrooms which are optimally suited for cultivation based mostly on the distinct microclimate. There are about 70 sub-species of oyster mushrooms, and therefore as a species, the adaptability of the oyster mushroom to distinct climatic areas is impressive. “The oyster can be grown in a multitude of various substrata, and which is what we are experimenting with correct now,” he elucidates. The oyster mushroom can prosper when developed on merchandise which would or else be waste, this kind of as discard from cultivating beans, sugar cane, agave (which includes the fibrous waste produced in mezcal distillation), peas, the typical river reed identified as carriso, sawdust, and the listing goes on. Agricultural waste which could normally be remaining to rot or be burned, each and every with adverse environmental implications, can kind substrata for mushroom cultivation. It need to be mentioned, although trite, that mushroom cultivation is a hugely sustainable, eco-friendly business. More than the past many many years Mexico has in truth been at the fore in many places of sustainable industry.
Mathieu exemplifies how mushrooms can serve an arguably even increased environmental great:
“They can maintain up to thirty thousand moments their mass, getting implications for inhibiting erosion. They’ve been utilised to thoroughly clean up oil spills by means of absorption and hence are an essential vehicle for habitat restoration. Research has been carried out with mushrooms in the fight towards carpenter ant destruction it really is been recommended that the use of fungi has the potential to totally revamp the pesticide business in an environmentally pleasant way. There are virtually hundreds of other eco-friendly applications for mushroom use, and in each circumstance the mushroom remains an edible by-product. Just take a appear at the Paul Stamets YouTube lecture, six Techniques Mushrooms Can Conserve The Planet.”
Mathieu and Jiménez can often be discovered promoting their products on weekends in the organic and natural marketplaces in Oaxaca. They’re each more than satisfied to talk about the nutritional benefit of their goods which range from in a natural way their fresh mushrooms, but also as preserves, marinated with both chipotle and nopal or jalapeño and cauliflower. The mushroom’s vitamin B12 can not be discovered in fruits or veggies, and appropriately a diet which involves fungi is very crucial for vegetarians who cannot get B12, most often contained in meats. Mushrooms can very easily be a substitute for meats, with the gain that they are not loaded with antibiotics and hormones usually located in industrially processed meat items.
Mico-lógica also sell teas and extracts manufactured from diverse mushroom species, every single formulated as both a dietary dietary supplement, or for their medicinal homes. Even though neither Mathieu nor Jiménez has the pharmacological qualifications to prescribe mycological treatment method for critical ailments, Mathieu’s possess study points to the medicinal use of mushrooms relationship from pre-history, to the existing. He notes houses of mushrooms which can support to restore the immune technique, and hence the use of fungi as a complement in the therapy of cancer and AIDS, and their utility in managing diabetic issues and treating large cholesterol.
“We must all be embracing the natural manufacturing of mushrooms,” Mathieu concludes. “It truly is so simple, it involves a minimal capital expense, and it supplies substantial benefits, equally for individuals ingesting hongos for dietary and medicinal factors, and for the producers, even modest scale. Mico-lógica also sells dried mushrooms. Yet most of the dried mushrooms offered in Mexico are imported from China, and are not organic. It truly is a true shame on quite a few stages.” morel mushrooms