Worry about Tet flower season
(Baonghean) -As Tet approaches, the weather is becoming more and more unpredictable, affecting the growth of flowers. Flower growers are facing a worry: if there are no flowers, there is no Tet.
There is only a little over a month left until Tet. People in traditional flower-growing villages near Vinh City such as Nghi Kim, Nghi An, and Hung Dong are working hard to take care of their flowers to serve the Tet market. At this time in previous years, the flowers were lush and green, but now many flower gardens are stunted and lacking vitality. Ms. Thai Thi Hanh, from Kim Chi flower-growing village, said: This year, the planting happened during a heavy rainstorm, so many plants were damaged. Every house has plants that were flooded and rotten. Other plants are underdeveloped and stunted. The weather is becoming more and more erratic, making it difficult to have flowers for Tet. Ms. Hanh added that last year, her chrysanthemum garden was about to bloom when it rained, so more than half of the garden was lost. This year, she decided to move the flowers to her home garden so that water could drain in time when it rained.
Taking care of the chrysanthemum garden waiting for Tet.
For flower growers, the weather determines 70-80% of success. But it is difficult to know how the weather will develop. In previous years, hundreds of households in two flower-growing villages in Nghi An commune rushed to plant flowers in the fields. After a few crops, due to the poor drainage system, every time there was heavy rain, many flower areas of the people were submerged in water, and after a long time, they were considered a total loss. Therefore, people had to plant flowers in their gardens. Mrs. Hoang Thi Can's household in Kim Chi hamlet is one of the leading households in the flower-growing profession in the whole commune. The entire 2 sao of her family's garden is covered with flowers and ornamental plants. Although she has been growing flowers for many years, according to Mrs. Can, her experience has not helped her family "win" over the weather. “Like last year, many houses were flooded and lost everything. My house has a good drainage system so the damage was insignificant. The reason why the flowers are still growing poorly is because of the heavy rains at the end of November,” Ms. Can shared.
Not only are flower growers “constantly worried” about the weather, they also have headaches because of the quality of seeds, the constantly increasing production costs, and complex pests and diseases. Because they are not proactive in the source of seeds, flower growers have to depend on nurseries outside Hanoi. Every time the season comes, they just need to call and they will send flower seeds. Although they save time, the quality of seeds is not carefully selected. “The quality of seeds is getting worse and worse, leading to more and more pests and diseases, so the cost of pesticides is getting higher. We are surrounded by so many difficulties,” said Ms. Can.
However, it is easy to see that flower growers in craft villages have not dared to invest. The seasonal flower growing mentality, mainly for Tet, of the people has made this profession not bring high value. Mr. Tran Ngoc Quyet, Trung My flower growing village, Hung Dong commune (Vinh city) is known as one of the people who dare to invest in growing flowers. Currently, in Mr. Quyet's garden there are all kinds of flowers such as chrysanthemums, lilies, phangs, dahlias, violets... Each flower growing season, he earns about 100 million VND, of which the investment cost for seeds, fertilizers, nets, and pesticides is more than 30 million VND. "The whole craft village has about 100 households growing flowers, but my family is the most daring to invest. Recently, I spent tens of millions of VND to buy plastic bags, nets, and growth stimulants. In addition, I also bought more soil to increase the fertility of the soil," said Mr. Quyet.
Mr. Quyet's family currently grows more than 3 sao of flowers. He is also the one who receives flower seeds to supply to the remaining households in the village. As someone with nearly 15 years of experience growing flowers, Mr. Quyet believes that if people boldly invest and take good care, growing flowers will certainly be successful. This year's flower crop, he boldly invested more than 45 million VND to buy 3,000 lily bulbs to plant. This is a Dutch lily variety, so the planting technique is relatively complicated. When it is sunny or rainy, it must be covered with nylon, otherwise the flowers will be damaged. "If the weather is favorable, the lily plants will be sold for more than 50 thousand VND. The profit is very high, but in the Central American flower village, very few households dare to boldly invest in growing this type of flower," he confided.
While the weather is becoming more and more complicated and harsh like now, Tet flower growers are still struggling with the "50-50" situation.
Pham Bang
