Gia Vien speeds up rice harvest outside the dike to avoid small floods

The winter-spring crop has quite favorable weather, so the rice yield outside Hoang Long dike in Gia Vien district is much higher than in previous crops. With the motto "Green at home is better than ripe in the fields", communes with ripe rice areas are speeding up the harvest, because every year, the small flood season will come in about 5 days.

Comrade Dinh Anh Tuan, Head of the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development of Gia Vien district, said: This crop, the whole Gia Vien district planted 5,941 hectares of winter-spring rice, the rice area outside the Hoang Long dike was about 640 hectares, accounting for nearly 11%. Most localities have rice areas outside the dike, many low-lying areas are planted by farmers with medicinal seedlings.

It is known that this is the main crop (1 crop) of the year in Gia Vien district, bringing high income value to farmers, so the whole district directs planting in the best time frame. Therefore, this winter-spring crop, especially the early spring rice area outside Hoang Long dike, the District People's Committee has directed communes and agricultural cooperatives to take advantage of the weather, plant in the best time frame, and fertilize early so that the rice grows and develops quite well. Many communes and cooperatives organize for members to plant in the field, so that when the rice ripens simultaneously, they can ensure that the harvester is brought down to the field to harvest quickly, limiting the damage caused by rats at the end of the crop.

Paddy — Flat area, farmers bring machines down to thresh rice in the field.

Starting from May 10, farmers in the localities here have started to quickly harvest early winter-spring rice outside the dike. A typical example is Gia Hung commune, where the area of early winter-spring rice planted outside the dike is 193 hectares, accounting for 56% of the total cultivated area of the commune. Up to now, two cooperatives of Gia Hung commune, Do Luong Cooperative and Hoa Tien Cooperative, have completed harvesting about 40% of the rice area outside the dike. Preliminary assessment of the average yield is estimated at 230kg/sao, an average increase of nearly 30kg/sao compared to the previous crop. Gia Hung commune is expected to harvest the rice area in the field around May 25.

In the ripe rice fields, the bustling atmosphere of harvesting rice outside the dike started very early. Today, Mrs. Nguyen Thi Reo's family in Dong Tien village, Gia Tien commune mobilized more workers to harvest the ripe rice. Mrs. Reo happily said: "All workers were urged to go to the fields very early to harvest quickly, because in the next few days, the flood could come at any time. This morning, my family of 5 people gathered to quickly harvest 2 sao of ripe rice."

Like Mrs. Reo's family, at this time, farmers whose rice fields outside the Hoang Long dike have ripened, their top priority is to spend all their "time and manpower" in the fields to quickly harvest the rice. Talking with leaders of some localities: Gia Thinh, Gia Lac, Gia Trung, Gia Tien, we learned that in these localities, the rice fields outside the dike are only planted in the early spring crop.

Before 9 o'clock, many farmers had brought their rice home to dry. In the high, dry fields with hard ground, most families rented harvesters. In the low-lying areas with water, families mobilized to exchange labor and increase manpower to quickly harvest the ripe rice.

Because the rice fields are low and the rice plants have fallen on the surface of the fields, it is impossible to bring in a harvester, so some families in Hoang Long village, Gia Trung commune hire more workers to manually harvest the ripe rice. Stopping his sickle, a farmer happily said: This is the rice growing area outside the dike. Therefore, when the rice is ripe, it must be harvested immediately. This alluvial land is in the middle of the Hoang Long river, so when going to the field, there must be a strong force to not only "harvest to avoid the sun", but also "harvest to avoid the flood". In the morning, they just harvest the rice lying on the ground, neatly, neatly pile it up and dry it until noon to dry the rice flowers. In the afternoon, the family increases the number of workers, harvests the entire area, then pulls all the harvested rice ashore, rents a threshing machine right at the foot of the dike and only brings the rice home...

According to the assessment of the district's Department of Agriculture and Rural Development and comments from some farmers, this winter-spring crop, in general, Gia Vien district's rice outside the dike has a good yield, equivalent to the previous crop. Partly because many localities have increased the area of hand-planted rice, the weather is favorable, the amount of fertile alluvium is high, and there are also fewer pests and diseases.

To protect the planted rice areas, the Board of Directors of Cooperatives has stepped up propaganda and mobilized the entire population to participate in rat extermination, strongly urging rat extermination right from the beginning of each production season. Many Cooperative Boards of Directors have established rat extermination teams. These rat extermination teams sign a commitment with the Cooperative Board of Directors to ensure that members' planted rice areas are not damaged by pests and diseases.

Ripe golden rice with high yield is the driving force urging farmers to mobilize human resources and machinery to quickly harvest rice outside the dike. By May 13, Gia Vien district had harvested about 30% of the rice area outside the dike, with an estimated yield of 64.5 quintals/ha.

Currently, Gia Hung, Gia Phu, Gia Thinh, and Gia Trung communes have harvested 30-50% of the ripe rice area outside the dike. It is expected that by May 20, the entire district will have finished harvesting the entire rice area outside the dike.

Article and photos: Minh Duong

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