After nearly a week of plum harvest, members of Tien Dat Cooperative in Yen Thi village, Long Phieng commune (Yen Chau, Son La) have returned to pruning and trimming the trees, preparing for a new plum season.
A touch breaks the frost
Mr. Tran Van Hong, Director of Tien Dat Cooperative, said that the whole cooperative has 8 members, with a plum growing area of about 30 hectares. Compared to other cooperatives in Yen Chau, the plum growing area at Tien Dai Cooperative is not large, but in the past few years, every year has a good harvest. People's income is stable, with many households earning billions of dong each year. Plum has also become a tree that can make people rich in this remote area.
"The secret to this is that farmers can make it rain anytime they want with their smartphones," he revealed.
According to Mr. Hong, in Long Phieng commune, plum is a traditional crop. However, many years ago, plum farmers often had to suffer from losing crops due to frost.
Because in this highland area, every year from November to January of the following year, frost often appears. Plum gardens planted on flat land are more heavily affected by frost.
"The dew only appears for a few hours in the early morning and then dissipates. But it causes the young plums to burn and rot. Plum flowers and leaves cannot survive if the frost is too thick," he said.
Frost usually appears at 3-4 am. In the cold winter weather, no one can get up at that time to water the plants to break the frost (water to wash away the frost). Therefore, farmers can only hope for rain to save their plum orchards.
3-4 years ago, members of the cooperative watched some high-tech agricultural programs online. Everyone saw the automatic irrigation model and learned to follow it.
Accordingly, households with good economic conditions invest in automatic irrigation systems for their entire plum acreage. Households with less capital do it gradually, using as much money as they have.
Water is taken from wells dug on the hill. Water pipes run up the tree trunks, and sprinklers are arranged to suit each plum tree canopy. This irrigation system is controlled via an app on a smartphone.
The investment cost to install this system for 1 hectare is up to 50-70 million VND, and it can be used continuously for 10 years. In return, farmers like him can sit anywhere and hold their phones to order watering for their entire garden of several hectares.
"With this automatic irrigation system, it's easy. In the cold winter, while lying in a warm blanket, farmers can control the irrigation system to remove the frost on the plum trees. The system works just like the sky pouring rain," he boasted.
Up to now, 90% of the cooperative's plum area has been installed with this automatic irrigation system. It is expected that this year, 100% will be installed.
Plums on the market, farmers livestream to sell everywhere
At Tien Dat Cooperative, not only is an automatic irrigation system installed to break up frost, Mr. Do Van Hoang also applies VietGAP standards, fertilizes with organic fertilizers, and prunes branches to create an open canopy. Therefore, at the beginning of the season, his family's 4 hectares of plum trees yielded 20 tons of early-ripening plums, with prices ranging from 70,000 to 100,000 VND/kg, earning a revenue of 1.5 billion VND. That's not counting the amount of plums in the main crop.
Mr. Ha Duc Thuong, a member of Tien Dat Cooperative, also chose to improve quality by taking care of and pruning branches and fruits on the tree to concentrate nutrients for the remaining fruits to grow evenly, have beautiful appearance, and meet the standards of Ruby plum.
This is a large plum, ranging from 18-20 fruits/kg, with purple-red skin and a sweet taste. In the past 2-3 years, this plum has been popular in the market, with a selling price 2-3 times higher than normal plums, he shared.
According to Mr. Hong, the cooperative currently harvests two plum crops a year. Of which, off-season plums (early plums) are harvested from the 15th day of the first lunar month to the beginning of the fourth lunar month. Although the output of off-season plums is not as high as the main season, the selling price at the garden is up to 90,000-120,000 VND/kg depending on the time.
“The automatic irrigation system that can break up frost also helps the early plum crop have better yield and fruit quality,” he said.
After the early plum season ends, farmers will switch to harvesting the main-season plums. Because off-season plums bear fruit from the trunk (old branches), while main-season plums bear fruit from the young branches at the top, so in the same garden, both off-season and main-season plums can be harvested.
The selling price of plums in the main season depends on the type and time. The price of Vip plums is 70,000-80,000 VND/kg, but this type of plum only accounts for 10-15% of the output. The price of green plums is from 15,000-20,000 VND/kg, sometimes the price is only 7,000 VND/kg.
The cooperative's plum output this year is about 600 tons, with an estimated revenue of about ten billion VND. Of which, households that grow a small amount earn several hundred million, while households that grow a lot earn billions.
Sharing about the consumption market, Mr. Hong said that last year, about 35% of the cooperative's plum output was consumed on e-commerce platforms, the rest was supplied to markets, supermarkets... This year, the amount of plum consumed on the platform decreased, but members livestreamed to sell everywhere, so the output was relatively stable.
In the coming time, the cooperative will continue to invest and research to spread out the harvest, while improving the quality and design of products, he said.
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