Clip: Mr. Luong Van Muoi, Director of Hoa Muoi Agricultural Service Cooperative (Chieng Khoong Commune, Song Ma District, Son La Province) is an Excellent Vietnamese Farmer 2024 and wishes to have more capital to expand production, invest in processing and consuming agricultural products, specifically longan processing.
Farmers face difficulties in expanding production
Following the staff of the Farmers’ Association of Song Ma District (Son La), we went to Chieng Khoong Commune, which is considered the fruit capital of Song Ma District. From the upper village to the lower hamlet, everywhere we saw farmers discussing about growing fruit trees for high income.
From planting, caring, harvesting to consumption, everything was discussed. When asked about typical households in cultivating and developing fruit trees in the area, everyone praised farmer Luong Van Muoi, Director of Hoa Muoi Agricultural Service Cooperative (Chieng Khoong commune, Song Ma district, Son La province).
Mr. Muoi is a pioneer in the movement to transform crop structure, introduce new crop varieties into cultivation, proactively apply scientific and technical advances in production, apply VietGAP standards, create seasonal fruit products, bring high productivity and economic efficiency.
Mr. Luong Van Muoi, is also honored to be one of 63 typical farmers nationwide selected by the Council as "Outstanding Vietnamese Farmer 2024".
Mr. Luong Van Muoi, Director of Hoa Muoi Agricultural Service Cooperative (Chieng Khoong Commune, Song Ma District, Son La Province), takes care of his family's longan garden. Photo: Van Ngoc
Mr. Muoi's longan garden is about 5 hectares wide on the side of a high hill. Initially, Mr. Muoi only dared to try planting 1.3 hectares of late-ripening Khoai Chau (Hung Yen) longan variety. He worked, learned, and accumulated experience, and only when he saw high efficiency did he expand production to the entire 5-hectare area.
To achieve high value from longan trees, Mr. Muoi has spread out the harvest by structuring the early ripening longan variety T6, combined with using Kaliclrat to treat 10% of these longan trees to flower and bear fruit extremely early. Thanks to that, since April of the solar calendar, his family has had longan trees on the market, selling at an extremely high price of 30 - 35 thousand VND/kg.
However, in the process of cultivating longan orchards, because Mr. Muoi switched from another profession to agriculture, he also encountered many difficulties in thoroughly applying scientific and technical advances in cultivation, from fertilization, pruning, grafting, pest control to harvesting,...
“Currently, in the process of cultivating longan, I encounter difficulties in preventing diseases on the tree as well as drastic measures to handle longan trees when they flower and bear fruit out of season. We hope that all levels and sectors will have more training courses on fruit tree development, especially for longan trees that bear fruit out of season. Through the training courses, we will grasp the techniques to apply in our family's longan garden,” said Mr. Muoi.
The longan garden of Mr. Luong Van Muoi's family, Director of Hoa Muoi Agricultural Service Cooperative, Chieng Khoong, Song Ma district, Son La province, is located on a steep slope. Photo: Van Ngoc
According to Mr. Muoi, the most important factor in producing off-season longan is having enough water to irrigate the garden. Mr. Muoi's longan garden is located on a hillside, so having enough water to irrigate his family's longan garden is quite difficult.
Currently, to solve the immediate problem of irrigation water, Mr. Muoi's family has only dug a large hole in the middle of the garden, lined it with waterproof agricultural tarpaulin, pumped water from the stream up to fill it up, and then watered each tree.
“For off-season longan cultivation, irrigation is indispensable. However, with the large area of the family's longan garden, investing in a standard irrigation system that is convenient for cultivation, especially in the dry season, requires a large investment capital, beyond the family's ability.
I hope the government will have preferential support policies to help farmer members like us have large, long-term loans to invest in building water tanks and installing stable, scientific irrigation systems that conveniently water every tree," said Mr. Muoi.
Mr. Luong Van Muoi, Director of Hoa Muoi Agricultural Service Cooperative, wishes to participate in more training courses on science and technology. Photo: Van Ngoc
Farmers want more capital to expand production
Not stopping at developing household economy, with the desire to connect and apply science and technology in production, increasing income; 8 households in Huoi Bo village, Chieng Khoong commune (Song Ma) have contributed capital and production land to establish Hoa Muoi Agricultural Service Cooperative, developing safe fruit tree planting according to VietGAP process. Mr. Muoi was elected to hold the position of Director of the Cooperative. Up to now, the Cooperative has 14 members, producing nearly 50 hectares of fruit trees including: mango, longan,...
In order to develop sustainable fruit trees with high economic efficiency, in recent years, the Cooperative has coordinated with the Agricultural Service Center and Farmers' Associations at all levels to organize training courses on transferring techniques for planting and caring for fruit trees according to VietGAP standards; mobilize members to invest in irrigation systems, automatic irrigation, use organic fertilizers, biological pesticides in production... Currently, the Cooperative has 20 hectares of longan and 10 hectares of mango that meet VietGAP standards.
Mr. Luong Van Muoi, Director of Hoa Muoi Agricultural Service Cooperative, wishes to participate in more training courses on science and technology. Photo: Van Ngoc
However, according to the Director of Hoa Muoi Agricultural Service Cooperative, in the process of cultivating and developing fruit trees, the cooperative encountered many difficulties.
Mr. Muoi explained that growing fruit trees on sloping land is not as easy as in flat areas or valleys. Because the fruit orchards of the cooperative members are mainly located on steep hills. Some gardens require traveling on rocky roads, winding steep hills, and wading through rocky streams. This greatly affects the travel, care, and transportation of goods for consumption of the cooperative members.
“The roads to the gardens are currently very difficult, muddy in the rainy season, dusty in the dry season. Especially in the fruit gardens, the roads to the gardens must go through streams, on harvest days, when it rains heavily, the stream water rises, making it difficult for cooperative members to transport goods to traders, leading to delays in the supply of goods to customers.
This not only affects the quality of the fruit that is ready to be harvested, the transportation process damages the goods, but harvesting at the wrong time will affect the flowering and fruiting of the next crop.
“I hope the government will support the construction of bridges across streams and upgrade internal roads to orchards to make it easier for us farmers to travel, reduce unnecessary costs, and feel more secure in our work and production,” said Mr. Muoi.
Hoa Muoi Agricultural Service Cooperative hopes to have more capital to expand production. Photo: Van Ngoc
According to the Director of Hoa Muoi Agricultural Service Cooperative, in order to expand production, improve productivity and product quality, and increase income for members, in addition to consuming fresh longan, the Cooperative also encourages and mobilizes members to build drying kilns to process longan.
However, to build a longan drying system requires a large amount of capital. The cooperative has difficulty in finding capital to build a drying oven to ensure production, expand production to participate in the safe food supply value chain; strictly control from the initial production stage to collection, processing and consumption, creating products that are safe for users' health, with traceability.
"We wish to expand production and consumption links with farmers; seek and connect investments, sign production contracts, and purchase products with businesses, supermarket chains, trade centers, wholesale markets, etc.
"Building a code for growing longan areas for export to foreign markets. I hope that all levels and sectors will have more capital to support investment in building more longan drying kilns to proactively purchase products for cooperative members and longan growers, contributing to increasing product value and income for members," said Mr. Muoi.
Source: https://danviet.vn/nong-dan-viet-nam-xuat-sac-2024-den-tu-son-la-de-nghi-ho-tro-xay-dung-ha-tang-che-bien-nong-san-20240929180746129.htm
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