White. Red. Brown. Black. These are the colors of the mushrooms produced by the Balikatan Farmers Multi Purpose Cooperative (BFMPC) based in San Angel village in Rosales, an eastern Pangasinan town.

The members used to produce only the kabuting saging (native variety) and the oyster mushroom.

But Coop manager Venacio Abalos said that lack of dried banana leaves to grow kabuting saging ("the easiest variety to grow as it takes only 10-12 days for spawn to germinate") forced the members to shift to oyster mushroom (Pleurotus ostreatus) and venture into bagging technology – making fruiting bags where oyster mushrooms grow.

The project was a successful one that the coop could hardly cope with the demand for the fruiting bags. "We produce an average of 4,000 fruiting bags and 3,000 bottles of spawn each month which we deliver to different towns of Pangasinan and other provinces," Abalos said.

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