4,000 VND/kg of lychee, should people keep the trees or cut them down?

Ms. Nguyen Thi Sau's family in Trung Chinh village, Yen Khe commune planted 18 lychee trees, each tree is full of fruit. Ms. Sau shared: "The family's 18 lychee trees were planted in 1996, both to provide shade and to harvest fruit.Since planting, this has been the best year for the crop, but also the cheapest year. Currently, the average price of lychees sold in the garden is only 4,000 VND/kg. Because the price is so low, my family had to travel to the market in Con Cuong town to sell them, and they got about 8,000 to 10,000 VND/kg, much lower than last year's price of 20,000 to 25,000 VND/kg."

Con Cuong currently has about 40 hectares of lychee. Harvesting the fruit is also quite difficult as people have to climb tall trees to harvest. Photo: Bao Han

Even though it was so cheap, it was still very difficult to sell. Every day, Ms. Sau got up at 5am, carried the fabric around the market, and waited to find a buyer.She added that the lychee season is usually short, and when the lychee starts to ripen, it must be harvested quickly (within 20 days). If the lychee is not picked in time, it will crack, turn dark, and be difficult to sell. Therefore, to harvest on time, her family had to hire more workers, and after deducting expenses, there was not much left.

Due to the difficulty in selling, Ms. Sau boiled the lychees in boiling water, then dried them in the sun, dried them, and stored them for sale during Tet. Photo: Thang Binh

Sun-drying and hand-drying. Photo: Thang Binh

Her family's 18 lychee trees have now been half harvested, with each tree yielding an average of 5-7 kilos of fruit. Due to the high yield and low selling price, Ms. Sau has boiled the lychees in boiling water, then dried them in the sun.preserve and store for Tet sale

Facing the same difficulties in output as Ms. Sau's family, lychee growers in Con Cuong district this year and many years ago are in a situation of having a good harvest but still unhappy because the lychee price is too low and difficult to sell. To get a slightly higher price, people can only concentrate all their manpower to harvest and transport to the wholesale market in town to sell. If they live far away and cannot bring it to the market, they have to suffer the loss, regretfully watching the lychee fall off the tree.

Mr. Vi Van Phuc was sad because his family had harvested lychees for 2 days but no one had bought them. Photo: Bao Han

Mr. Vi Van Phuc's family, also in Trung Chinh village, Yen Khe commune, has more than 40 lychee trees. He shared that this year they harvested more than 1 ton of fruit. Because the purchase price was too cheap, and the family had no one to harvest them, if they hired workers, they wouldn't have much left after deducting the cost, so his lychees couldn't be harvested in time, and were cracked and falling all over the ground. "Now I just want anyone who comes to buy at the garden for 3-4 thousand, I will sell them off" - Mr. Phuc said sadly.

According to information from the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, the district currently has about 40 hectares of lychee, mainly intercropped scattered in household gardens, with the lychee growing area concentrated in some places such as Chi Khe and Chau Khe previously invested by the Pu Mat Project.

The lychee variety in Con Cuong is mainly derived from Luc Ngan lychee, Bac Giang. Ripe lychee has red color, light fragrance, thick flesh, although plump but when peeled not sticky with water, delicious sweet and cool taste... But that delicious taste and aroma still cannot help farmers find a way to escape the situation of low selling price and unstable output.

Many people regret the low price at the garden so they bundle them up and sell them on the street. Photo: Thang Binh

Although the harvest was good, through conversations with the people, we often encountered a concern that was not knowing whether to continue growing lychee or cut it down to replace it with another crop. Because to grow lychee, people have to spend a lot of effort and money, and when harvest time comes, the price is too cheap.

Despite such concerns, most people here still choose to continue growing lychee because they regret the loss of their lush lychee trees and the techniques they have accumulated over the years. They hope that next year the price of lychee will increase or the output will be more stable.