Drought, forest sim crop failure, expensive house sim

At this time every year, sim trees in the Ru Nhon area (Hung Nguyen) are in full harvest, but this year the fruits are very few, small and dry. Ms. Nguyen Thi Thanh, a resident of Hung Thanh commune, said: "Every year, I can collect at least 5-7kg of sim trees a day, earning 200,000-300,000 VND. This year, due to the drought, the sim trees are barren, dry and have no fruit, so the people have lost their crops."

The mountainous areas in Thanh Ha, Thanh Huong, Thanh Duc, Thanh Lam (Thanh Chuong) are full of sim trees, but due to the prolonged hot weather, the sim crop has suffered a severe failure. The whole hill has yellow, drooping leaves, and the flowers have not yet had time to set fruit before they have dried up on the trees. Therefore, at this time, even though it is the harvest season, not many people go to the forest because there is no sim fruit. Even after a whole day of walking, they can only collect a few kilos, and the fruit is dry, small and astringent, so they cannot be sold for much money.

Mr. Nguyen Trong Ky, a resident of Thanh Lam commune (Thanh Chuong) said: "In previous years, from June to September, the couple earned tens of millions of dong from harvesting wild sim. In a good sim season, there were days when they could pick a hundred thousand sims and sell them to traders, earning 300,000-400,000 dong. This year, they have to endure the drought, the sim crop failed, and there was no harvest."

The natural hill sim crop fails, while for households that grow sim in concentrated areas, fence off and take good care of them, they bring in significant income. Ms. Nguyen Thi Chung's family (Hamlet 3, Hanh Lam Commune, Thanh Chuong) grows 6 sao of sim. For the sim tree to grow well and produce high yield, she invested in a drilled well, an automatic irrigation system, and took care of the sim according to the right techniques such as fertilizing with manure, potassium and pruning the tops when the sim tree is taller than a person. Thanks to that, the sim tree is full of fruit, plump and has a rich sweet taste.

“This area used to grow tea, but the tea trees died and could not be saved, so the family switched to growing sim trees. This sim variety is a native tree, dug from the hills in the commune and transferred to the garden to be planted. Planted since 2021, currently 4 sao are harvesting in the second year and 2 sao are bearing fruit. Thanks to proactive irrigation and good care, the sim trees produce large, plump and abundant fruit. There are sim trees that can harvest 10-15 kg/season,” said Ms. Chung.

After harvesting, the Sim is purchased by traders at the garden at a price of 40,000-50,000 VND/kg. This year, the wild Sim crop failed, the fruit is small and barren, so the beautiful Sim in the garden is quite expensive. At the beginning of the season, Sim was priced at 60,000 VND/kg, now it is 50,000 VND/kg, 10,000-15,000 VND/kg higher than previous years.

“This year, only concentrated growers, areas with irrigation water have a good harvest of sim. Sim is scarce, the price is higher than previous years, but there is no product to buy. There were years when people bought 300-500 kg of sim every day, and people brought it in to import in large quantities, but this year, we have to go and collect it on site,” said Ms. Nguyen Thi Hai, a trader specializing in buying sim and bo quan in Hung Nguyen.

Currently, the demand for wild sim to make sim wine, sim syrup, sim tea is quite high, sim is easy to consume, the price is stable. Therefore, in Nghe An, many households have started to bring sim trees to plant in barren hills, wasteland, intercropping under the forest canopy to both generate income and increase land cover, creating ecological landscape.

However, to develop sim trees into commodities, localities need to have specific plans, connect, encourage and support businesses to diversify products from wild sim trees to create stable output for wild sim trees, avoid massive, spontaneous planting leading to surplus, cutting down and causing waste.

According to oriental medicine, sim fruit has a sweet, astringent taste, neutral properties, and has the effect of promoting blood circulation, stopping bleeding, nourishing blood, and activating the joints. It is often used in cases of physical weakness, anemia due to blood loss, anemia due to pregnancy, weakness after illness, nervous breakdown, tinnitus, and spermatorrhea. With the good properties of this fruit, in the past 10 years, the demand for wild sim to soak in wine, make syrup, make sim tea, etc. has increased sharply. Realizing the economic value of this wild fruit, many localities in the province have had plans to effectively protect, protect, and exploit sim trees.