Millions on worms

Shymkent resident Sholpanai Dosaliyeva is making millions from worms. Very soon, she will start teaching this business to all who wish to learn, reports World of NAN with reference to Atameken.

Sholpanai's business is growing California worms. Six months ago she started a "worm" farm right in the yard of her private house.  She began this business on the advice of her 14-year-old son, who had the idea of growing agricultural products without "chemicals". He also convinced her of the profitability of the business, because Californian worm is the perfect processor of any organic plants in biohumus.

Sholpanai started with 150 thousand tenge for which she bought worms from the largest vermiculture farmer in Shymkent. Six months later she made a profit of 5 million tenge from the sale of worms! Today she has expanded the territory of her farm, placing the worms on the farmsteads of her relatives as well.

"The technology is very simple: right on the ground under a layer of manure live exotic toilers who work for you 24 hours a day. During the day, each of them passes through a mass of manure twice their own. The finished product, biohumus, is sifted through, and the fertilizer is ready. It multiplies the fertility of the soil. To maintain the activity of "Californians" it is necessary to take care of them only once a day: to feed them with substrate manure, stir them up and water them. The worms themselves multiply quite intensively. After three months there are 10 times more of them", says the businesswoman.

Sholpanai is a former bank employee. Later she worked in different spheres, but according to her, no previous job brought such an income as raising California worms.

Sholpanai delved deeper into the new field of agriculture, vermiculture, markets for worms and biohumus, and came to the conclusion: there is a high demand for them. There is not enough of biohumus. Even if they start producing it in large quantities.

"The most valuable thing is that this type of business can be done on private farms by large families, mothers on maternity leave, families with children with disabilities, adults with disabilities. After all, California worms require no special care. And I thought, why not scale up the project, because it's good for everyone: both for households, and for the agro-industry, and for the environment," says Sholpanai.

Today, A. Arkhabayeva, chairwoman of the Business Women's Council, is actively seeking programs and grants to support Sholpanai's project, and is discussing it with officials in the highest levels of government.

"We decided to create many cooperatives in Shymkent and Turkestan region for growing California worms, for which Sholpanai will prepare a start-up package and teach them how to do business. In the future we plan to launch a factory for the production of liquid biohumus in industrial volumes, where these cooperatives will deliver organic fertilizer," said Alma Arkhabayeva, Chairwoman of the Business Women's Council.

Both businesswomen also shared far-reaching plans: to create in Shymkent the Union of Vermiculture in Kazakhstan, which does not yet exist in any other region.

Смотрите больше интересных агроновостей Казахстана на нашем канале telegram, узнавайте о важных событиях в facebook и подписывайтесь на youtube канал и instagram.