Spring peanut crop failure, Nghe An farmers suffer losses

This spring crop, the entire Thuong Tan Loc commune (Nam Dan district) planted 30 hectares of peanuts. Currently, this area has been harvested. However, according to local people, this crop has significantly decreased in yield. The average yield is only about 2 quintals/sao, a decrease of 30 to 40 kg/sao compared to last year's spring crop.

Ms. Nguyen Thi Minh, a farmer in Minh Tan hamlet, said: "My family grows 3 sao of peanuts, but this year's yield is much lower than previous years. The reason is that there was a lot of rain at the beginning of the season, the peanut fields were flooded, and then pests and diseases developed strongly, so the plants were stunted and had few tubers."

Despite low productivity, thanks to early harvest, Thuong Tan Loc people still sell at good prices. According to records, the retail price of fresh peanuts fluctuates around 25,000 VND/kg, and the wholesale price to traders is around 20,000 VND/kg, 3,000-5,000 VND/kg higher than last year.

The crop failure is even more serious in Dien Chau - the district with the largest peanut growing area in the province. Ms. Tran Thi Chien, a farmer in Dien Trung commune, lamented: "My family grows 3 sao of peanuts, but the yield is only about 1.3 quintals/sao, down 70kg/sao compared to last year. If last year we earned 4 million VND/sao of peanuts, this year we only get about 1 - 1.5 million VND."

Not only low productivity, the quality of peanuts this year has also been seriously affected. Due to the effects of weather and pests, peanuts are unsightly, many tubers are flat, leading to peanut prices in many places currently being 2,000 - 3,000 VND/kg lower than last year.

Mr. Hoang Van Hai - Chairman of the Farmers' Association of Dien Thinh Commune (Dien Chau) informed: "The whole commune has 360 hectares of spring peanuts. Currently, people have harvested about 40% of the area. The average yield is only 1.34 quintals/sao, in some places only 1 quintal/sao, a sharp decrease compared to last year's spring crop".

According to Mr. Hai, the main reason for the peanut crop failure is unfavorable weather. At the beginning of the season, there were many long cold rains in the area, causing localized flooding. During the flowering, shoot-out, and tuber-forming stages, peanut plants encountered many dangerous pests and diseases such as black mold root rot, white mold root rot, bacterial wilt, root collar rot, armyworms, etc., causing the plants to die in clumps.

The peanut crop failure has caused many households to lose their crops. With an average investment of 1.2-1.5 million VND/sao, if the yield is only 1-1.5 quintals/sao, many households will have almost no profit. Not only that, last night (May 10), heavy rains spread over a large area, many peanut areas that had not yet been harvested were deeply flooded.

“The fields were flooded, the peanuts were flooded when they were ready to be harvested, and if we didn’t harvest them in time, the tubers would crack and rot,” a farmer in Dien Thinh commune lamented. This morning (May 11), when the weather cleared up and some areas were flooded, Dien Thinh people rushed to the fields to harvest.

According to statistics, the whole province has about 7,200 hectares of spring peanuts, concentrated in Dien Chau, Nam Dan, Yen Thanh, Do Luong and Hung Nguyen districts. The main peanut varieties grown include: Nghe An Sen (75/23), L14, L23, TB25, L20... With unfavorable weather and pests like this year, if there are no timely solutions, the risk of crop failure continuing to recur in the following crops is very high.

Therefore, in the coming time, the agricultural sector needs to strengthen training on cultivation techniques, introduce peanut varieties with good pest and disease resistance, and support farmers in accessing early disease prevention solutions. Only then can peanuts - one of the main crops in the spring crop - maintain stable productivity and income for farmers.