Mushrooms have been considered as ingredient of gourmet cuisine across the globe, especially for their unique flavour and have been valued by humankind as a culinary wonder. More than 2,000 species of mushrooms exist in nature, but around 25 are widely accepted as food and few are commercially cultivated. Mushrooms are considered as a delicacy with high nutritional and functional value and they are also accepted as nutraceutical foods; they are of considerable interest because of their organoleptic merit, medicinal properties and economic significance (Miles and Chang 2004, Ergönül et al 2013).

Mushroom cultivation can also generate huge employment opportunities for unemployed (Shakil et al 2014). It plays a very significant role to eradicate malnutrition, alleviate poverty and create employment opportunity for rural unemployed folk specially the rural farming community (Rachna et al 2013).

The demand of mushroom has been increasing day by day due to population growth, market expansions, changing of consumer education and awareness along with the developments in the manufacturing industries, storage facilities and transportation. It is a well established fact that the rural unemployed individuals can be developed, their outlook can be changed and their ideas can be given a true shape of enterprise through regularly organized vocational training/ motivational programmes. Mushroom cultivation is environment-friendly and they biosynthesize their food from agricultural crop residues, which are readily available in rural areas. Moreover, mushroom production can often be recommended to a situation where large scale capital-intensive operations are not possible (Dalmia and Kumar 2018).

The present study was, therefore, conducted to evaluate the impact of vocational trainings on mushroom cultivation on the knowledge gain of the rural farmers.

Krishi Vigyan Kendra, Bawal, Haryana conducted four vocational training courses on mushroom cultivation during 2022-23 for the farm men/ women and rural youth in the villages. A sample size of 120 respondents was selected for obtaining the data. For evaluating the impact of vocational training programmes, data were collected on the general profile of the trainees. The data were also collected from the trainees regarding the purpose of their participating in the training programmes. A pre-training test was conducted to know the level of knowledge of participants regarding types of mushrooms, their nutritive value, diseases, preparation of casing material, harvesting techniques, storage, preservation etc. After completion of the training courses, post-evaluation was done in order to assess the knowledge gained by the trainees. Gain in knowledge was calculated from the difference of scores obtained in pre- and post-training tests of the trainees. Suggestions from the trainees were collected for bringing further improvement in the vocational training programmes. The data were analyzed using frequency, percentages and ranking.

Socio-economic profile of the trainees: The data (Table 1) show that almost half of the respondents (50.36%) were in the age group of 26-40 years followed by 37.30 per cent who were above 40 years and 12.34 per cent below 25 years of age. Majority of the respondents (46.40%) were landless farm labourers followed by 30.30 per cent who were marginal farmers with less than 1 ha and 23.30 per cent big farmers having more than 1 ha landholding. Out of the total respondents, 60.00 per cent belonged to backward class, whereas, 40.00 per cent were scheduled cast. Most of the trainees (45.00%) were educated up to primary level, 35.00 per cent up to middle level and only 20.00 per cent were matriculate. Majority of the trainees (53.30%) were involved in farming; 28.30 per cent had been doing household work and 18.30 per cent were involved in vegetable selling.

Reasons of participation in vocational training programmes: Data given in Table 2 depict the reasons of the trainees behind the participation in vocational training programmes. Majority of the respondents (48.33%) participated in the trainings to adopt mushroom cultivation as an enterprise followed by 12.50 per cent each who wanted to learn about mushroom growing techniques for self-consumption and learn the techniques of mushroom compost production at the home, 11.67 per cent to teach other men/women farmers about mushroom cultivation and 10.83 per cent to get certificate of vocational training course. Only 4.17 per cent respondents participated in trainings just to know about mushroom cultivation.

Earlier, Kaur (2016) reported that 63.5 per cent respondents joined training course to adopt mushroom growing as an occupation, 12.9 per cent wanted to learn about mushroom growing techniques for self-consumption and 10.6 per cent joined the training course just to get the certificate of training. In a study conducted by Manyam et al (2020) in Nellore district, Andhra Pradesh, reported that majority of the respondents (63.6%) expressed to establish mushroom enterprise as the reason for attending training programme.

Increase in the level of knowledge: Data given in Table 3 show that there was considerable gain in knowledge of the respondents after the training programmes. The gain in knowledge of the respondents after the trainings varied from 54.0 to 94.1 per cent on various aspects of mushrooms. Maximum gain in knowledge (94.1%) was recorded regarding diseases of mushrooms and their control followed by preparation of mushroom spawn production (91.5%), method of compost/manure making (88.3%), method of preparation of casing material (88.2%), nutritive value of mushrooms (88.0%), varieties and types of mushrooms (78.0%), knowledge about diseases controlled by consumption of mushrooms (77.9%), storage and harvesting techniques of mushroom (74.1%), market price and profit from mushrooms (69.5%), value addition to mushrooms (65.4%) and knowledge about identification of good quality/edible mushrooms (54.0%).

Vishwakarma et al (2023) reported that after training, 76.8 per cent of the trainees gained the knowledge of preparation of compost, 75.2 per cent each of nutrition and health benefits and harvesting methods, 73.6 per cent of different types of mushrooms and 75.2 per cent of uses by different mushroom recipes. Overall, the study concluded that the training effectively increased participants’ knowledge in all aspects of mushroom production.

Kaur (2016) recorded maximum gain in knowledge (94.1 and 92.9%) on diseases of mushrooms and their prevention and varieties of mushrooms respectively. Mazumdar et al (2020) observed that the knowledge gained after exposure to training programme on mushroom cultivation was satisfactory in all aspects in comparison with pre-training knowledge score. The exposure to training had increased the knowledge of farmers regarding mushroom production techniques by 73.7 per cent.

Manyam et al (2020) observed 72.24 per cent average change in perception level of respondents on major aspects of mushroom cultivation before and after trainings and demonstrations. Kavitha et al (2019) observed that 63.88, 59.72 and 55.55 per cent of the trainees were deviating knowledge on types of mushrooms, preservation techniques and importance of casing after training respectively. Thus exposure to training had increased the knowledge of respondents related to all the sub-components of mushroom production.

Ranjitha et al (2018) identified that, prior to the training, the trainees were less aware with respect to their knowledge and understanding about the mushroom cultivation aspects. But after the training, there was significant increase in the knowledge level of trainees. All the trainees had positive change in the level of knowledge after the training. Mavi and Thakur (2021) observed that pre-training knowledge score was not much satisfactory for all the aspects of training programme. However, the knowledge score gained by respondents after training was more satisfactory in all the aspects. The study revealed that exposure to training had increased the knowledge of participants regarding techniques of mushroom production by 80.75 per cent.

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