Utilization of Empty Palm Oil Bunches as a Growing Media for Mushrooms

 Empty fruit bunches (tankos) of oil palm, which are waste from oil palm plantations, turn out to be very well used as a planting medium for Merang mushrooms, and other mushrooms that can indeed be consumed by humans.  This was stated by the Head of the Department of Soil Science, Faculty of Agriculture, University of North Sumatra (USU), Abdul Rauf, to MedanBisnis, Tuesday (17/6), in his office.

 He said that all this time, tankos had been allowed to rot in oil palm plantations.  This matter

 actually interfere with the growth of oil palm that will be planted next, because tankos take a long time to decompose.

 “It takes three months to compost materials that are easily weathered.  Moreover, tankos which has a lot of fiber can even take up to six months," he said.  According to him, if tankos are left unattended, it will hamper plant growth and even die, because of the immobilization process.  "Immobilization means that nutrients in the soil that should be absorbed by plant roots for photosynthesis, are instead taken up by microbes that are growing rapidly due to tanks that are not cleared from the land," he said.

 In the past, continued Abdul Rauf, tankos were used as fertilizer for palm trees.  Fertilizer is obtained by burning tankos to heat the kettle, so there is a term for long ash.  This long ash is used to fertilize palm oil.  But the potassium levels in this fertilizer are very high and damage the environment.

 “Meanwhile, there are also oil palm plantation entrepreneurs who take a practical way, namely by burning their palm oil fields to clear the tankos.  But burning oil palm land clearly damages the environment, therefore burning land has been prohibited by the government,” explained Abdul Rauf.  And tankos media turned out to have nutrients that are also needed by fungi.  For this reason, the use of tankos as a growing medium for mushrooms is very good to be developed.

 "Now, I think that using tankos as a medium for growing mushrooms can solve problems in oil palm plantations," he added.  Utilization of Tankos In response to this, the Department of Soil Science will conduct training on mushroom cultivation using tankos media.  This training will be held on 28-29 June 2008 in Tebingtinggi.  According to Abdul Rauf, the use of tankos for mushroom cultivation media has been carried out by community groups in Tebingtinggi.  The Department of Soil Science will bring students to this location for training.  "Actually, we will hold a briefing on field work practices (PKL) for students, but in this briefing, we provide training like this to students," he said.  According to him, in addition to being able to overcome the problem of oil palm plantations, this is also to broaden students' insight in terms of entrepreneurship.

 “Later on, we also want to make a kind of mushroom cultivation using tankos media in this soil science department.  Well, this can also be an opportunity for students to become entrepreneurs," he said.

 Abdul Rauf further said that the training that will be carried out can also be attended by students outside of USU's soil science department.  "Other students can also come, they can contact us," he said.

FOOD SOURCES OF PALM OIL WASTE

 Hearing the words "waste", most people immediately assume something dirty, toxic and can not be used anymore. This image must be changed because with good handling, waste can increase added value and even increase product diversity. One of the wastes generated from the processing of fresh fruit bunches (FFB) is empty bunches, with a ratio of 20-22% of the FFB weight. Tankos which is waste can be applied to the field as fertilizer containing good nutrients for plants.

 Tankos before being applied to the field, actually still has a fairly high economic value because it can be used as a medium for mushroom cultivation (Volvariella volvaceae), because according to Lampung Post (2004), for every 1600 kg of empty bunches for 40 days will produce 65-70 kg fresh mushroom at a price per kg of Rp. 30,000. Figure 1. Mushrooms with empty bunch media

Read also efficiency of use of fertilizer

When viewed from a health perspective, edible mushroom (Volvariella volvaceae) is very good for consumption because it contains 14-35% protein. Compared to rice (7.38%) and wheat (13.2%), mushrooms have higher protein content. There are nine types of essential amino acids found in mushrooms from a total of 20 types that we know, namely lysine, methionine, tryptophan, theonin, valine, leucine, isoleucine, histidine, and phenylalanine. While the calories contained in mushrooms are 100 kj/100 grams with 72% unsaturated fat. Mushrooms are also rich in vitamins, including B1 (thiamin), B2 (riboflavin), niacin, and biotin. For minerals, mushrooms contain K, P, Fe, Ca, Na, Mg, Mn, Zn, and Cu. Mushroom fiber is very good for digestion. The fiber content reaches 7.4-24.6% making it suitable for dieters. Cultivation of edible mushrooms using tankos is relatively easy because of the relatively short time and minimal cost. The mushroom cultivation technique using tankos media is as follows (for 1600 kg tankos):

 Spread the tankos with a thickness of 10 cm evenly, sprinkle 50 kg of bran and 30 kg of lime.

 After eight days, put the tankos into a closed room that can be heated to a boarding temperature of 370 C

 Regular watering every morning and evening to taste

 On the 20th day it can start the first harvest and continue for 20 days with an average harvest of 3.5 kg/day

 Imagine, if a mill has a capacity of 30 tons/hour to process an average of 600 tons of FFB every day, then the production of edible mushroom is 5,775 kg/day. It's a fantastic number to support the Government's Food Security Program.

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