Strengthening drought prevention and control

Regiment 719 has more than 656 hectares of various crops, including 294 hectares of coffee. Although it has proactively taken measures to store irrigation water, due to the prolonged hot weather, while the area where the unit is located has not had any rain for many months, the unit's coffee trees as well as the people's gardens have withered on a large scale.

The garden of Production Team 2, Regiment 719 is withered due to lack of irrigation water.

Mr. Nguyen The Kieu, a worker of Production Team 2, residing in Hamlet 5, Duong 10 Commune, Bu Dang District, has a coffee and cashew garden with a total area of over 2.3 hectares next to the dam of Production Team 2, Regiment 719. He said: Since the beginning of the year, Bu Dang District has been experiencing severe heat and prolonged drought, causing the dam next to his house to dry up 2 months ago. He hopes that the unit as well as the local government will find a solution to provide irrigation water to save his family's garden as well as the gardens of other households in the area.

Currently, the lakes and dams in production teams 2, 3, and 5 of Regiment 719 have dried up, and the soil under the lake has cracked for many months. To improve the situation, the unit has dredged and dug deep, long holes to find a source of irrigation water. However, this water source is unlikely to be sufficient compared to the large area of dry coffee trees.

Lieutenant Colonel Nguyen Van Thuc, Commander of Regiment 719, said: In the past, the unit had stored 100% of the first irrigation water, however, due to the prolonged heat, the lake and dam water dried up, so the second irrigation was only 50% of the area, the rest ran out of water, causing the coffee trees to gradually wither. To save the garden, the unit hired excavators and workers to dredge 5 lakes and dams with an area of 5,000m3 to provide irrigation water for 30 hectares of coffee in 3 production teams. In areas far from lakes and dams, the regiment is urgently drilling 3 water wells with industrial drills, 200m deep. After completion, it will provide irrigation water for 15 hectares of coffee in 3 production teams and provide domestic water for dozens of households in the neighboring area as well as the kindergarten.

“The drought area is very large and is expected to last for a long time, so we have implemented solutions such as drilling wells, dredging lakes and dams, but it only provides a small part of the irrigation water source. Currently, resources are limited, while dredging lakes and dams requires a large amount of funding. We hope that superiors as well as local authorities will coordinate to support funding to continue dredging lakes and dams to ensure irrigation water supply for production teams and people,” Lieutenant Colonel Nguyen Van Thuc suggested.

The heat has not shown any signs of abating, and drought will continue in the coming time, so in addition to drilling wells, dredging lakes and dams, it is necessary to strengthen water-saving irrigation solutions and propagate and mobilize people to share water resources with each other.

Production Team 2 Lake has been dry for months.

Regiment 719 hired workers and machinery to dredge and deepen the dam to improve irrigation water sources, but it was difficult to ensure enough water.