November is also the last banana harvest of the year. Everywhere you go in Nam Chay, you can see motorbikes and cars carrying bananas going back and forth.
Mr. Giang Diu Hoa, Vice Chairman of Nam Chay Commune People's Committee, said that this year, bananas are priced from 6,000 - 7,000 VND/kg (same period last year, the price was only 4,000 - 4,500 VND/kg), the high price makes banana growers very excited. The joy is doubled when dried banana leaves are also priced, in 2023 they were only 14,000 - 16,000 VND/kg, this year they have increased to 21,000 - 23,000 VND/kg.
Mr. Ly Sao Chiu’s family, Pa Di ethnic group, Coc Ngu village currently has more than 3,000 banana trees. In addition to the income of more than 400 million VND from selling bananas, he also collected nearly 1 ton of dried banana leaves, which were sold for 18 million VND.
Mr. Chiu said that after harvesting the fruit, the tree will be cut down to save nutrients and water for the young tree. Normally, dry banana leaves are left to rot, but now they can be sold for money, so people actively harvest them.
Harvesting banana leaves is quite easy, so women and the elderly often do this job. Picking the dried banana leaves that have fallen down, the collector only needs to use a knife along the stem to get 200 - 300 grams of dry leaves, 3 - 4 leaves make 1 kg of dry leaves.
Banana leaf harvest season lasts about 30 - 40 days after harvesting banana fruit. The leaves are already dry on the tree so the product does not require any additional processing steps.
An ordinary worker can collect and select 25 - 30 kg of dried banana leaves per day, selling for 500 - 600 thousand VND, higher than the income of a main construction worker.
"In the commune, there are 2-3 small traders who buy dried banana leaves. People who buy the leaves just need to load them onto a motorbike, bring them to the scale and they will have money right away," added Vice Chairman of the People's Committee of Giang Diu Hoa commune.
Banana leaves are expensive, but not every family can take advantage of this economic benefit due to lack of labor. Currently, people are focusing on harvesting bananas. For example, Mr. Giang Diu Hoa's family also grows about 4,000 banana trees. Since there is no one to harvest the leaves, he leaves the harvesting to some poor workers.
Dried banana leaves have been purchased by small traders for several years now, and are sold mainly in the provinces of Hai Duong, Ninh Binh, and Thanh Hoa, where traditional cake making (mainly gai cake) is strongly developed. The domestic market is stable, and the selling price of dried banana leaves is always higher year after year, so banana growers are very happy.
During the years of the Covid-19 pandemic, tissue-grown bananas were difficult to sell or had low prices, so many people in Nam Chay reduced their banana acreage to grow perennial trees. Now, the product price has increased, dry leaves are priced well, so the area of tissue-grown bananas in the area is increasing again and tissue-grown bananas still hold the position of the number 1 "rich tree" in Nam Chay.
University (according to Lao Cai newspaper)Source: https://baohaiduong.vn/la-chuoi-goi-banh-gai-ninh-giang-mang-lai-thu-nhap-cho-nguoi-dan-toc-thieu-so-o-lao-cai-399733.html
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