'Three pronged attack' creates economic triangle

Improve the efficiency of seafood exploitation and processing activities

We arrived in Lach Quen (Quynh Thuan) on a day at the end of July. It was the middle of the moon (June of the lunar calendar), so most of the offshore fishing boats were anchored in the port, only a few boats returning late were transferring fish to the refrigerated trucks that had been waiting for a long time.

The nearly 1,000 CV trawler with the license plate NA 90000TS of Mr. Tran Van Phuc docked after more than 3 days of fishing in the Gulf of Tonkin. This was Mr. Phuc's second "trip" of the month. "Just a few tons, not much" - a crew member was carrying a tray of hairtail fish onto the pier and said. It is known that after two fishing trips in July this year, Tran Van Phuc earned about 500 million VND. But that is still only the common "floor" level of offshore fishing fleets in the coastal district of Quynh Luu.

Fishermen of Quynh Luu district fishing in the Gulf of Tonkin. Photo: Nguyen Khoa

The most prominent name is still a familiar name to many people, that is Minh "Lung" - Nguyen Van Minh in Dai Bac village, Quynh Long commune. Just in the "dark night" at the end of the sixth lunar month, Mr. Nguyen Van Minh's boat earned 1.3 billion VND from selling seafood. Each worker on the boat received more than 40 million VND. This information was not provided by Mr. Nguyen Van Minh but came from Mr. Nguyen Song Lam - a wholesaler in Lach Quen. Mr. Lam currently receives seafood for 17 offshore fishing boats in Quynh Luu. He said that every night he buys about 200 tons of fish. After purchasing, he imports the fish to Cua Hoi and then processes it for export to Thailand and Laos.

In addition to Mr. Lam, in Lach Quen there are also a number of wholesalers who purchase different types of fish to sell in the domestic market and export to the Chinese market... Mr. Nguyen Song Lam also said that to facilitate the purchase of seafood for fishermen, he is preparing documents and establishing a project to rent land in Quynh Thuan commune to build a processing facility.

"Only when a processing facility and a large-scale freezer warehouse are built will the fish have high value, fishermen and buyers will not suffer losses and will meet the requirements of the Fisheries Law and the criteria of the European Community - EU."

Mr. Nguyen Song Lam - Lach Quen

Crew members of the NA 90000TS ship bring fish ashore after a fishing trip. Photo: DT

In fact, if based on comparative advantages, few localities in Nghe An can "surpass" Quynh Luu district in developing marine economic occupations. In 5 years, the whole district has built 133 new ships with a capacity of 400CV or more, bringing the total number of ships to 1,170, the most in the province. Modern equipment is equipped such as fish finders, long-range communication devices (ICOM), voyage monitoring devices, LED lighting... The output in 2020 is estimated at 66,765 tons, an increase of 34.89% compared to 2015. The average value of aquaculture production is estimated at 491.25 million VND/ha/year, an increase of 63 million VND compared to 2015.

Exploitation, fishing, aquaculture and seafood processing are still identified as the key economic sectors of Quynh Luu, but the policy of local leaders is to have "quality" innovation. Instead of increasing quantity, investing and building new ships massively as before, the district directs fishermen to change their exploitation methods accordingly, focusing on converting and upgrading fishing equipment with modern equipment and machinery to meet the requirements. Linking exploitation activities with aquaculture and deep processing to create a large value chain.

Currently, the processing sector is still simple and small-scale, which both wastes aquatic resources and fails to fully utilize the potential and advantages of the locality. To realize this policy, Quynh Luu district has established a project to plan the Lach Quen processing area with a scale of 30 hectares. When completed, the processing area will contribute to solving the problem of increasing income for workers as well as solving the problem of fishing logistics.

People dry fish. Photo by Nhat Thanh

According to the development orientation, Quynh Luu district strives to have an aquaculture area of ​​about 2,500-2,700 hectares by 2025, with a production value of 600.4 million VND/ha; the output of exploitation and aquaculture of 80-85 thousand tons, of which the output of aquaculture is 12-13 thousand tons. Bringing the proportion of seafood processing and export to over 50%.

Taking beach tourism to a new level

In recent years, tourists inside and outside the province have known Quynh beach with increasingly vibrant tourism and service activities. Quynh Luu has a coastline of about 19.5km, which is an advantage for exploiting and developing sea tourism. Tourists coming to Quynh beach have the opportunity to enjoy moments of pleasure with the waves on the gently sloping beach.

Quynh Nghia commune has also formed resorts to serve tourists to relax and enjoy their vacations. Mr. Dao Dinh Thong, a tourist from Thanh Xuan district, Hanoi city, said that in the summer, his family often chooses to travel to the beach and this is the second time Mr. Thong has brought his whole family to Quynh beach.

Tourists come to swim at Quynh Nghia beach (Quynh Luu). Photo: PV

"The sea here is clean, the sand is fine and the slope is not steep. After swimming, you can go ashore and enjoy seafood caught by local fishermen. Most notably, Quynh beach still retains many wild features, and the people here are also very friendly."

Mr. Dao Dinh Thong - Thanh Xuan District, Hanoi

In fact, more and more tourists come to Quynh beach to experience the new and attractive things here. The vacation schedule will be: swimming, enjoying seafood caught by fishermen, taking a boat to visit small islands along the coast, caves, visiting Ho family temple and Quynh Doi commune's examination village, admiring historical, cultural, spiritual and religious works such as: An Thai pagoda, Lam Son pagoda, Quy Linh temple, Con temple (Hoang Mai).

Even if there is a need, tourists can also visit the fishing port, see the seafood processing process of the local people. Especially experience the spirulina processing facility of Hidumi Pharma Green Science Joint Stock Company in Quynh Luong commune. This is the only unit in Nghe An that has researched and successfully cultivated Spirulina algae products originating from Japan. Coming here, tourists have the opportunity to choose spirulina products for beauty and health improvement from spirulina products that meet international standards.

Spirulina processing facility in Quynh Luu. Photo courtesy

To make tourism an important economic sector of the district, the guiding spirit of Quynh Luu is to focus on investing in developing facilities and technical infrastructure, especially key coastal traffic routes; upgrading and completing the square in Quynh Bang commune, the tourist wholesale market in Quynh Nghia commune, developing Quy Linh temple festival into a district-level festival; synchronously developing types of tourism such as beach resort tourism, spirituality, cultural and historical tourism; developing some new types of tourism such as agricultural, experiential, ecological, and discovery tourism...

Focus on attracting and selecting investors with experience and potential in developing tourism infrastructure. Strive for the number of tourists to increase by an average of 10-11% per year, and for revenue to increase by an average of 11-12% per year.

Green vegetable barn of Nghe An

Also closely associated with the economic development of coastal areas, Quynh Luong commune has long been famous throughout the North and South with its four-season green vegetable brand.

Despite the lack of favorable climate and soil conditions, on an area of ​​nearly 300 hectares, Quynh Luong people have raised the cultivation and production of green vegetables to a specialized skill. To increase the value of green vegetables, irrigation systems, drainage, and grid electricity have been brought to the fields by the people. Therefore, despite the hot season and southwest wind, the vegetable fields are still lush. Green vegetables in Quynh Luong commune have also been branded and registered for geographical indications.

Vegetable field in Quynh Luong commune. Photo: Nhat Thanh

And not only Quynh Luong, communes such as Quynh Minh, Quynh Bang, Quynh Van of Quynh Luu district are also considered as the color production areas of Quynh Luu district with an area of ​​about 1,400 hectares. Quynh green vegetables not only serve the domestic market but are also present in Hanoi and spread to the North Central provinces such as Thanh Hoa, Ha Tinh, Quang Binh, Quang Tri...

Transforming the agricultural economic structure and choosing to develop vegetables can be considered a step in the right direction, in line with the farming tradition as well as the development trend of Quynh Luu district. The district has also formed a number of concentrated production areas with high economic efficiency: 1,400 hectares of vegetables, 1,000 hectares of pineapple, 900 hectares of sugarcane; building 478 effective production models for widespread replication, of which 5 models apply high technology in greenhouses in Quynh Bang, Quynh Nghia, Tan Son, Quynh Luong, Quynh Giang communes...

The general spirit of the locality is to focus on restructuring the agricultural production sector towards large-scale concentration, high-tech application, clean products, food safety, associated with processing and expanding product consumption markets. Prioritizing and creating favorable conditions to attract businesses to invest in agriculture and rural areas associated with product consumption linkage programs and the One Commune One Product program. Along with that, building new models of organic agricultural production points in the communes of Quynh Bang, Quynh Luong, Quynh Minh, Quynh Van, Tan Son... to replicate on a large scale...

Quynh Luu farmers take care of vegetables. Photo: Viet Hung