Economic Feasibility Study of Mushroom Production: an Integrated Experimental Design and Discrete Simulation Approach

Experimental design and simulation modeling are not commonly used methods in determining economic feasibility of investment projects. However, the advantage of integrating those sciences was taken to perform feasibility study on mushroom project which has non-deterministic parameters. Therefore, a set of experiments (scenarios) were obtained from feasibility parameters and performed using a simulation model. The best scenario was selected according to the highest Net Present Value. Mushroom project proposed in this study introduces a new local industry to Gaza Strip. This project is quietly important; it constitutes a new high nutritional value food for the people of Gaza, and provides a fair source of income to many needy families. Further, mushroom cultivation process is assigned to women and housewives, which would greatly increase women role in society.