Orange growers in Nghe An are struggling because of poor quality varieties.

(Baonghean) - It is the main orange harvest season, but some orange gardens that have reached commercial age in the districts of Quy Hop and Nghia Dan... have all produced small fruits like lemons or no fruit at all, with stunted trees and yellow leaves. Many households have cut down their entire orange gardens after many years of investment.

Many households cut down orange gardens

At the time when orange growers were harvesting the main crop in November, we visited the orange growing areas of Quy Hop and Nghia Dan districts - the key areas for Vinh orange products. Besides the orange gardens full of fruit, of good quality, and selling at good prices, there were many orange gardens infected with diseases, not producing fruit or small fruit, stunted trees and yellow leaves... partly due to planting poor quality seedlings. Many garden owners had abandoned the garden without care, without harvesting, and some had to sadly dig up the entire orange garden to replant.

Many orange garden owners in Quy Hop district had to dig up their entire orange gardens due to planting poor quality orange varieties. Photo: PV

Stopping by a 4-5 year old orange garden, the owner, Mr. Le Quang Hoa in Minh Dinh hamlet, Minh Hop commune (Quy Hop), was using a saw to cut off the orange branches with yellow leaves. Mr. Hoa said: I thought this year there would be a good harvest from the orange garden after 4 years of care, but unexpectedly the oranges got yellow tea leaf disease (yellow like green tea leaves after cooking), many trees did not produce fruit. Knowing that this disease is very difficult to prevent, Mr. Hoa could only cut off the diseased branches. For trees that were completely infected, there was no other way but to dig up the roots and replant them.

Mr. Hoa confided: In 2013, he and his wife invested hundreds of millions of dong to plant 1 hectare of oranges, with 450 orange trees of the Xa Doai yellow heart variety. Determining that growing oranges requires a lot of investment and good care to have a high income, every year Mr. Hoa invests in fertilizers and takes care of them according to the correct process. However, after 4 years of hard work in the orange garden, up to 1/3 of the total number of trees are infected with yellow tea disease. According to Mr. Hoa, the reason the orange garden is infected with the disease is due to poor quality seedlings.

In Van Loi and Minh Hop communes (Quy Hop), there are orange garden owners who have dug up the roots and piled them up in a corner of the garden, preparing to burn them. It is known that there could be many reasons, but it is not ruled out that the orange garden is infected with disease. Standing in front of the piles of dry orange roots piled up in the garden, Mr. Phan Ba ​​Thuc, Minh Chua hamlet, Minh Hop commune, sadly said: For 7 years, he has devoted all his efforts and money to his 0.5 hectare orange garden, but each year he only harvests a few quintals of fruit, because every tree is infected with disease; he cannot prevent it, so he has to cut it down and replant it. Thus, his family falls into a debt of hundreds of millions of dong.

In Nghia Dan district, there is a similar situation. In recent years, farmers in Nghia Dan district have destroyed rubber forests or abandoned sugarcane to replace them with orange trees. However, due to lack of knowledge about orange varieties and the desire to buy cheap varieties, they have bought orange varieties that are floating on the market, many families have had to sadly destroy their orange gardens after many years of care...

This is the second year that Mr. Nguyen Van Tam's family in Hamlet 4B, Nghia Mai Commune, has been restless, as the whole orange garden has not yielded the desired results. Mr. Tam shared: "The family planted more than 1 hectare of Van Du and Xa Doai oranges, after 5 years of pouring in so much sweat, effort, and money, each tree only produced a few dozen fruits. The reason is that my family previously bought seedlings floating on the market. At that time, we knew we had bought seedlings of unknown origin, but if we didn't buy them, where would we get the seeds to plant? Now, if we cut them down, it would be a waste of years of care; and where would we get the money to buy seeds, fertilizers, etc. to plant again. But if we leave them, the harvest will not be enough to cover the investment costs!

Mr. Le Quang Hoa, Minh Dinh hamlet, Minh Hop commune (Quy Hop) cut infected branches. Photo: PV

Mr. Nguyen Van Nam - Deputy Head of the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development of Nghia Dan district said: Due to the rapid development of orange acreage, the demand for large seed sources is increasing, but the system of supplying disease-free seedlings in the district only meets a small part; therefore, farmers mainly use floating seed sources from outside, so when orange trees mature, they are potentially susceptible to many diseases, while the functional sector has difficulty in controlling them.

In Nghi Loc district, Mr. Nguyen Van Phuc, a farmer in Xa Doai area, belongs to a family that has grown oranges for many generations; he said that the Xa Doai orange variety in his hometown is not growing and developing as healthily as before, the number of fruits on the tree is decreasing, the fruits are smaller and the seeds in the fruit segments are increasing. Maybe this orange variety is gradually degenerating. Currently, his family is growing 30 orange trees, only 10 of which are growing quite well, each tree on average yields over 100 fruits; the remaining 20 trees only yield 60 - 70 fruits/tree.

Great practical lessons from seed quality

In fact, oranges are a tree that can help growers get rich, but it requires a large investment right from the time of planting the seedlings and the annual care process. After 4 years, oranges will bear fruit and can be harvested for about 9-10 years. However, if you buy poor quality seedlings, the garden owner will fall into a situation of "bankruptcy".

According to the calculations of orange growers, to intensively cultivate 1 hectare of commercial oranges, from land preparation to harvest, it costs 200 - 300 million VND, not to mention the labor. If the orange garden is good, by the fourth year, 1 hectare of oranges can yield about 20 tons of fruit, equivalent to about 600 million VND. If poor quality orange varieties are planted, the consequences that orange growers have to bear are very large, possibly double the investment. Because orange trees take 3 years to bear fruit, and usually at that time the orange trees show signs of infection, small, poor quality fruit. If left like that, there will be no harvest, so they have to be cut down and replanted, wasting a lot of effort and care materials.

According to Mr. Le Quang Hoa - owner of an orange garden in Minh Dinh hamlet, Minh Hop commune (Quy Hop), oranges are difficult plants. To have high productivity, the garden owner must invest heavily from the beginning and take care of them properly. Like Mr. Hoa's orange garden, every year he invests in chemical fertilizers, manure, pesticides, etc. to create a sufficient source of irrigation water, hire people to weed, etc.

According to Mr. Hoa, if a seedling is bought for 20,000 VND, then planting 1 hectare of oranges costs about 10 million VND for seeds, but other costs are from 100 to 1.20 million VND each year, such as fertilizers, pesticides, electricity for water pumping... In Mr. Hoa's case, because his family does not have the financial means, he had to borrow from relatives and banks up to nearly 300 million VND to invest in the orange garden, hoping that after 5 years of care, he will have money to pay off the debt. Now the orange garden is sick, and last season only 700 kg of fruit were harvested, worth only nearly 20 million VND. If the yellow leaf disease continues to spread throughout the orange garden, he does not know when he will be able to repay the loan.

It can be affirmed that farmers like Le Quang Hoa in Quy Hop and Nguyen Van Tam in Nghia Dan are among the few orange garden owners who are facing bankruptcy because of orange trees. The main reason is still due to buying poor quality orange varieties or not knowing how to prevent diseases on oranges.

An ineffective orange garden, partly due to planting poor quality orange varieties. Photo: PV

Mr. Hoang Minh - Director of Xuan Thanh Agricultural Company Limited said: Orange varieties are decisive for the yield and quality of oranges. If the orange varieties do not ensure quality, even if well cared for, they will be affected, especially the older the orange tree, the more obvious the symptoms of the disease. Growing oranges is highly profitable, but requires growers to accept large investments, so if they grow poor quality orange varieties, the consequences are huge. Orange trees take 4 years to harvest, each year orange growers need to invest from 100 - 120 million VND, so after 4 years, 1 hectare of oranges has a total cost of about half a billion VND. That number shows that if poor quality orange varieties are grown, orange growers can easily fall into bankruptcy, especially for households that borrow money to grow, the consequences are huge. That is not to mention having to dig up diseased oranges to replant.

It is known that the key orange area of ​​Quy Hop has 2,787 hectares of oranges and tangerines (2,255.5 hectares of oranges), of which 1,227.7 hectares are commercial oranges. Of these, about 350 hectares of commercial oranges are infected with yellow tea disease, most of which are Xa Doai oranges with yellow hearts. In Nghia Dan district, there are currently nearly 1,000 hectares of oranges, most of which are infected with various diseases.

PV Group

(To be continued)