Thung Coong Sugarcane is happy and worried

(Baonghean) - Sugarcane has been a staple crop for the Thai people in Chi Khe commune, Con Cuong for 10 years. Many people consider it a crop that can help alleviate hunger and reduce poverty. However, sugarcane can only be harvested once a year and requires a lot of care, so it is not a choice for households with few people and little land. On the other hand, after many years of cultivation, productivity has somewhat decreased.

The first crops yielded 80 tons/ha. Up to now, according to estimates by sugarcane growers, the yield is only about 40-50 tons/ha. In this commune, there is a sugarcane material area in Thung Coong, a long-standing cultivation area of ​​Thai ethnic villages, about 150 hectares wide, reclaimed by people for more than 30 years.

Access to the sugarcane fields is still very difficult.

For nearly 20 years now, people in Chi Khe commune have stopped slash-and-burn farming, because there is not enough forest left for the fields that are only cultivated once and then left fallow. Since then, people have settled down to cultivate. Decades ago, the villages in Chi Khe knew how to grow wet rice, but because of the old farming methods, poor quality seeds, and low productivity, the main source of food still had to rely on upland rice.

When settling down, start thinking about choosing suitable crops. Initially, it was still traditional crops such as corn, cassava, sesame. Some households have tried growing fruit trees such as oranges, lemons, and lychees. Recently, acacia trees are filling up steep slopes that are prone to becoming infertile when growing short-term crops.

During the years of searching for plant varieties for Thung Coong, it was thought that peanuts could be the ideal crop. Over 10 years ago, some households earned tens of millions of dong from growing peanuts. Then, for unknown reasons, as soon as they flowered, peanuts died en masse. This phenomenon occurred in dozens of peanut-growing households, causing people to have a headache trying to find a way to deal with it. Many measures were proposed, including planting peanuts off-season, but the results were not as expected. There was a family that sowed over 100 kg of peanuts on nearly 2 hectares of land, but at the end of the season, they only harvested nearly 100 kg of peanut shells.

When the villagers in Chi Khe thought they were stuck in finding a crop that would bring economic efficiency, a new direction was opened. At that time, Song Lam Sugar Company (Dinh Son - Anh Son) was expanding its raw material area. Realizing that Thung Coong could be an economically efficient raw sugarcane growing area, the local government held a meeting with households with production land in Thung Coong. Finally, sugarcane was accepted, because it was guaranteed a stable output, although the initial price per ton of sugarcane purchased at the field at that time was only 230,000 VND/ton. The factory also provided technical support and fertilizer, so many people were excited to grow sugarcane. By 2012, the price per ton of sugarcane was 950,000 VND. Households with a lot of production land and good care also earned a profit of about 50 million VND/ha each year.

Ms. Loc Thi Ky, who has been growing sugarcane in the Thung Coong economic zone for 10 years, said that in addition to the good income from sugarcane, sugarcane leaves are also a fairly abundant source of food for households raising livestock in the area, mainly buffaloes and cows. Thanks to the food source from sugarcane leaves, for many years now, neighboring villages have not had buffaloes or cows die during the cold season when grass is scarce.

One difficulty that has existed since the days when the Thung Coong economic zone started growing sugarcane is the roads. The entrances to the sugarcane fields are often steep, making transportation difficult, especially during the sugarcane harvest season when it often rains, making it even more difficult.

Some people said that the sugarcane varieties grown in the Thung Coong raw material area have low productivity and are only suitable for highly fertile soil. After many years of cultivation, the soil in the Thung Coong cultivation area is showing signs of exhaustion. "I hope the factory will invest in high-yield sugarcane varieties for Thung Coong, then the people will benefit a lot!" - Mrs. Lo Thi Mien, who has been growing sugarcane for 10 years, wished.

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