Crop structure conversion: Need for synchronous solutions

(Baonghean) - In recent years, implementing the policy of converting crop structure to increase the value of agricultural production, Nghe An has achieved encouraging results, forming many concentrated production areas, creating large volumes of goods and increasing income for farmers. However, to match the potential as well as create higher efficiency in agricultural production, many more effective methods and measures are needed.

The right direction but still slow

Hung Nguyen has 3 distinct economic zones in the development of agricultural crops: hilly land, rice land and alluvial land. In recent years, the policy and effectiveness of the district's crop restructuring are most clearly demonstrated in the riverside alluvial economic zone. Previously, this fertile land area was mainly used to grow corn and beans of all kinds. In recent years, the district has put into exploitation the direction of growing spring peanuts, then growing hot peppers, vegetables, carrots, especially areas with intensive farming conditions will focus on growing hot peppers for export under contracts signed with enterprises, accordingly, farmers will be provided and supported with seeds, care techniques and guaranteed product consumption.

Vegetables bring high income to farmers in Dien Chau district. Photo: Ngoc Anh

To promote the economic efficiency of this land, Hung Nguyen has built a Project for economic development of the coastal area until 2020, in which clearly identifies the direction of restructuring, converting all of more than 1,000 hectares of coastal land to growing vegetables and food for export. In addition to 350 hectares of various vegetables, the remaining area will specialize in producing spices. The district supports 30% of the project value to invest in building traffic infrastructure, power lines, irrigation, etc. "According to the clearly defined content in the project, by 2015, the amount of money from the district budget to invest in economic development in the beach area is 4.6 billion VND and by 2020 it is 21 billion VND. However, to be able to develop and exploit the full potential of this land, there are still many problems. The province still does not have a satisfactory mechanism and policy in supporting investment in building infrastructure to serve production such as power lines, traffic and especially irrigation, and has not invested in building to replicate beach area models. Enterprises mainly sell seeds and fertilizers, but have not coordinated much with localities and people in production and consumption of products" - Mr. Phan Van Truong - Head of the district's Agriculture Department worried.

In Yen Thanh district, in 2006 - 2007, the district had over 5 thousand hectares of winter corn, but in recent years, the area of ​​winter corn in the district has gradually "shrinked" and is now only over 2,000 hectares, while in reality corn products are in great demand, while the production output is not enough, feed factories in the province are still having to import corn from abroad. Mr. Nguyen Van Duong - Head of the district's Agriculture Department said: We are advocating expanding the area of ​​winter corn. At the same time, continue to expand the area of ​​crops with high economic efficiency such as vegetables, beans, sugarcane and especially build a separate project on developing mushroom production to increase income for people, not just focusing on developing rice as before. Accordingly, in deep land areas, Yen Thanh switched to combined fish - rice farming; Other crops and industrial crops with higher economic value also replace rice in high-land areas with limited water supply...

With over 180 thousand hectares of rice production per year, Nghe An currently has an annual rice output of over 900 thousand - 1 million tons, with an annual food demand of only about 800 - 850 thousand tons of rice, the surplus rice among the people is increasing. Meanwhile, we still have a lot of ineffective rice growing land, mainly concentrated in the midlands, low mountainous areas and low-lying areas with unstable production in the plains. Faced with this situation, in recent years, the province has had a policy of converting the crop structure, both in ineffective rice growing areas to other crops, both in fertile land areas but with unsuitable crop structures and bringing economic efficiency commensurate with the potential. In which, corn is considered one of the top priority crops. This is a crop with a fairly stable yield, which can reach 9 - 10 tons/ha, especially the consumption market is very easy and stable.

Currently, many localities have gradually switched from less effective and unstable crops to corn, typically Nghi Loc district in the last spring crop. Mr. Nguyen Duc Tho - Head of the Department of Agriculture of Nghi Loc district said: The district has gradually narrowed the peanut growing area to switch to corn. Reality shows that this is a right direction when Nghi Loc's spring peanut crop has been damaged and its yield has decreased severely due to drought, difficult consumption, while corn has a good harvest, is consumed quickly and has a good price. In addition to Nghi Loc, most localities have also converted and expanded the area of ​​other crops such as sugarcane, peanuts, vegetables of all kinds...

Thanks to the conversion of crop structure, the province has formed specialized areas for growing peanuts and other crops in Dien Chau and Nghi Loc from scattered rice fields, or areas for growing raw materials such as sugarcane and pineapple. In addition, in Dien Chau, Nam Dan, Thanh Chuong, Nghi Loc districts, there are areas that only grow one spring rice crop, then switch to growing vegetables, watermelons, etc., bringing in very high economic value, several times higher than growing rice; in addition, specialized areas for growing vegetables and melons in Nghi Loc and Quynh Luu bring incomes of up to hundreds of millions of VND/ha...

Need synchronous conversion

However, looking back objectively, the results of crop restructuring in our province are still not commensurate with the potential. The area of ​​corn is still small, currently the whole province has only over 10 thousand hectares of corn, soybeans and winter vegetables, while with about 55 thousand hectares of summer-autumn rice land and over 30 thousand hectares of winter-spring rice land, if done well, we can arrange about 25 thousand hectares of winter-spring production, bringing in a huge source of income. Other crops with high economic efficiency, either have modest areas, or in the production and consumption process, still face many difficulties. Mr. Ho Ngoc Sy - Director of the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, frankly said: Apart from some concentrated conversion areas, crop restructuring in the province is still mainly small-scale and "local" in each locality and each period, leading to the conversion efficiency still not really commensurate with the potential, at the same time leading to many problems. Most obviously, localities have not yet really identified key seedlings, thereby concentrating production in certain areas to create large volumes of commodity products, focusing on creating conditions for preservation, post-harvest processing as well as product consumption for farmers.

Thus, in order to transform the crop structure to truly bring about economic efficiency commensurate with the province's potential, first of all, Nghe An needs to clearly define a master plan for the whole province, in which the production focus of each region is determined in accordance with the actual conditions of the locality as well as the needs of the market. Each district will base on specific conditions, have its own detailed plan, from which there will be investment in building synchronous infrastructure, creating concentrated production areas to be able to synchronously apply scientific and technological advances, bring mechanization into production, create large volumes of products that are convenient for processing, post-harvest preservation as well as meet the needs of businesses in purchasing.

At the same time, when there is a specific plan and conversion according to the plan, we need to have policies to attract businesses to invest in building drying kilns and animal feed production facilities right in these concentrated production areas to ensure product consumption and improve economic efficiency.

In planning, it is necessary to link production with market demand to have a suitable production plan, avoiding the situation of product surplus. At the same time, there are measures to improve product quality, ensure food hygiene and safety to be able to bring our agricultural products to external markets, especially those markets considered "difficult", from which we can increase production value. And the most important thing is to have strong enough mechanisms and policies to attract businesses to participate in cooperation, accompany farmers in production and consume products from crop restructuring in agriculture.

Phu Huong