Mr. Bau's model forest planting

Nearly 40 years ago, in his twenties, Mr. Tran Ba Bau left Thai Binh for Quang Son commune (Hai Ha district) to start a business. "At that time, we young people were very enthusiastic, leaving to build the country, so most of us chose difficult areas. I followed the call from the Government's 661 forest planting program..." - Mr. Bau said .

He said, Quang Son was very difficult at that time, there were times when he wanted to return to his hometown. But then the fate with the girl from Quang Son kept him, deciding to make Quang Son a place to live and work.

Quang Son had a job of growing tea, picking tea for hire, collecting firewood in the forest to sell to Duong Hoa Tea Factory to roast tea... Those were things that could earn money to take care of daily meals. At that time, he was only familiar with vegetables and rice plants, not used to climbing forests and pulling buds. He thought that picking tea and collecting firewood were only short-term livelihoods, planting forests was a long-term livelihood.

Mr. Tran Ba Bau, director of Tran Bau Private Enterprise (left) next to his forestry seed garden. — Mr. Tran Ba Bau (left) introduces the company's forestry nursery. (Photo provided by the character)

At that time, the government encouraged people to reforest barren hills, and he received up to 30 hectares. Land was considered an asset, but the investment to improve the land, buy seedlings, hire workers, etc. was a difficult problem. He researched and determined to take the short-term to support the long-term, using the results of low hills to compensate for high forests, and maximizing the youth of both husband and wife.

He devoted 2 hectares of good land to growing tea, fruit trees in low-hill gardens, and acacia trees on high hills. When life began to stabilize and the forest trees were ready for harvest, he built a charcoal kiln to get charcoal to sell to households in need, instead of selling firewood to tea factories. He took advantage of the short-term situation to sustain the long-term situation, and his forest area expanded every year.

From 2000 to now, implementing the common goal of the province and district, Quang Son has promoted the production forest planting program. People in the commune began to realize the value and invest in the forest. Mr. Bau's forest planting model became a model, attracting many people to learn. Grasping this trend, Mr. Bau built a forestry nursery, both to serve his family's production needs and to provide nursery services for forest planting households. From a small scale with only a few common forest tree varieties, his nursery has now expanded with a variety of tea trees, fruit trees, forestry trees, urban trees, ornamental trees, etc.

In 2007, Mr. Bau established Tran Bau Private Enterprise. In 2015, his enterprise was selected by the district as one of the trusted partners to supply high-quality tea varieties to replace local tea varieties that showed signs of degeneration throughout the Hai Ha tea area. From 2020 to present, Mr. Bau has continued to upgrade his forestry nursery, ensuring the ability to supply in very large quantities. His nursery currently has many types of large timber trees, especially lim, giổi, and lat varieties, promptly serving the needs of forest economic development according to the development orientation of the district and the province.

Many years of attachment to the mountainous region of Quang Son, many years of working in the forestry profession, the result of Mr. Tran Bau is the love for this land and the growing love for the forestry profession. Mr. Bau's current assets are 68 hectares of green forest, a large-scale forestry seedling garden, an average annual income of over 2 billion VND, and a profit of about 30% - 50%. Mr. Tran Ba Bau has the conditions to contribute to the construction of the new rural commune of Quang Son in particular, and the new rural district of Hai Ha in general, and has the conditions to support many households with seeds and capital to develop the economy.

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