Con Cuong planted forests to replace slash-and-burn farming

(Baonghean) -Con Cuong is a district with a very large area of ​​natural forest (133,193 hectares), however, due to slash-and-burn farming practices, this locality loses a considerable area of ​​forest every year. The project "Replacing forests to replace slash-and-burn farming" in recent years has brought very positive results, gradually developing the forest area, stabilizing the lives of the people.

In the 2000s, the entire Con Cuong district had over 2,000 hectares of swidden fields. In 2010, implementing the state's policy of planting protective forests and production forests to replace swidden fields, the entire district still had about 700 hectares of cultivated area using this method, concentrated in four communes including Cam Lam, Chau Khe, Thach Ngan and Binh Chuan.

Implementing the state support mechanism, when stopping shifting cultivation to switch to afforestation, people in the project area will be provided with food until they have a replacement income. Accordingly, households with many people but participating in the conversion with a small swidden area will receive a subsidy according to the actual swidden area, but not more than 700 kg/ha/year; households with few people but participating in the conversion with a large swidden area will receive a subsidy according to the number of people at the rate of 10 kg of rice/person/month.

Forest care in Con Cuong.

When implementing the project, Con Cuong had very basic difficulties. People were used to farming, not interested in planting forests, while the localities that did farming were all remote communes. Mr. Le Quang Hop - Head of Con Cuong Forest Protection Department said: The farming areas were all very far from the people, just reed land, transportation was very difficult. In many places, one had to climb slopes and wade through streams all day to get there. Meanwhile, planting forests often had to be done in the rainy season, vehicles could not enter, many times the district had to use excavators to push vehicles carrying seedlings and fertilizers into the project area. At the same time, propaganda and mobilization work was carried out well to every village and every person. Forest rangers took turns staying in the area, guiding and checking how to dig holes and how to make fences to protect newly planted forests.

Thanks to appropriate measures as well as local efforts, in 2010, Con Cuong planted 100 hectares to replace the old swidden cultivation area. In 2011 alone, 345 hectares were designed and assessed for planting in the autumn crop, striving to cover the entire swidden cultivation area of ​​the three communes of Cam Lam, Chau Khe and Thach Ngan with acacia trees.

Mr. Hop said: Currently, there is only swidden land left in Binh Chuan commune, because the area is very remote, difficult to travel (from the nearest village to the project area takes 3-4 hours on foot), there are almost no roads. If the project is implemented, when there are products, it will be very difficult to transport. Therefore, it is expected that in 2012, the district will assign the Forest Protection Department to coordinate with the district's Agricultural and Forestry Production Steering Committee to conduct a survey, find suitable crops, and cover the forest area in this remote and extremely difficult commune.

Phu Huong