Nghe An farmers have good income from picking wild blackberries

It's currently the peak harvest season for blackberry fruit. Photo: Thanh Phuc

The whole communeThanh Lam(Thanh Chuong) has about 60 hectares of wild sim growing naturally on the hillsides. Sim flowers in March and the fruit is ready for harvest around the 6th lunar month. Harvesting time lasts until September. In the season of ripe sim, at 5am, Thanh Lam people gather in groups to go up the hills and mountains to pick sim.

Ms. Nguyen Thi Lanh, a resident of Thanh Lam commune, who was picking sim on Tram mountain, said: “The sim ripening season is also the time when farming is idle, the children are on summer vacation, so early in the morning, my husband and I and our two children go picking sim. The sim ripening season is at its peak, in about 3 hours, from 5am to 8am, 4 people can pick 20kg of sim, when going down the mountain, there are people who buy it right away at 35,000 VND/kg. This is a significant source of income for farming families like us.”

In the past, Thanh Lam commune was covered with sim hills. Tram hill, Trai hill, Con Danh lake hill… were all wild sim. But in the past, sim was just a “fun” fruit, with no economic value, so people cut it down and picked it for firewood.

In the past, sim trees had no economic value so they were cut down in large numbers. Photo: Thanh Phuc

Mr. Nguyen Van Toan, Chairman of the Farmers' Association of Thanh Lam Commune, said: "In the past, sim trees grew wild on the hills, with lots of fruit. Sim trees were abundant, there was no way to eat them all, they were sold cheaply and there were no buyers, so they were cut down to plant acacia trees, pine trees and gardenia trees to grow. In the past ten years, sim fruits have become a commodity, purchased by traders at high prices, so people have sought them out. Every time sim ripens, 70% of villagers go up the hills to pick sim, bringing in a fairly high income for the people."

On this occasion, people around the areaNhon and Thanh mountainsIn the communes of Xuan Lam, Hung Nghia, Hung Thanh… people bring along their “tools” including gloves, plastic bags, plastic baskets, and plastic baskets to pick sim. The old sim trees are taller than a person’s head, with a meter-wide canopy, stretching halfway up Nhon hill. This year, due to unfavorable weather, the sim does not bear as many fruits as in previous years and the fruits are also smaller.

The harvested blackberry fruits are purchased by traders and exported to provincial markets, and even imported to China through unofficial channels. Photo: Thanh Phuc

According to Mrs. Tran Thi Chuyen, an elderly woman living at the foot of Nhon hill, the ripe sim season brings the main income for her and her daughter, helping her earn extra money to cover her living expenses. “My house is right at the foot of Nhon hill. For more than 10 years, every time the sim season comes, my mother and I carry our baskets to the hill to pick sim. Some years the harvest is good, some years it is bad, some years the sim price is high, some years it is low, but on average, each day, both mother and daughter earn 300,000-500,000 VND from picking sim fruit to sell to traders. 3 months of harvesting sim also brings in tens of millions of VND, enough to cover major expenses during the year.”

In the communes of Xuan Lam, Hung Nghia, Hung Thanh... each commune has 3-5 agents specializing in purchasing fresh sim. After picking, people bring them to agents in the commune, the agents select, classify and then export to the northern and southern markets. Mr. Nguyen Hai Tho, a trader specializing in purchasing sim fruit in Hung Nghia said: "When the sim fruit ripens, we buy as much as people come to buy. At peak times, it can be up to a ton. This year, the sim fruit crop is bad, the fruit is smaller and not plump and beautiful, but traders are buying at high prices, so currently, the price we buy for people ranges from 30,000-35,000 VND/kg, almost double last year."

During peak season, some people can earn 200,000-300,000 VND in a few hours from harvesting 'forest gifts'. Photo: Thanh Phuc

From now until the seventh lunar month, it is the peak season for wild sim harvesting. Local people in Thanh Chuong, Do Luong, Anh Son, Yen Thanh, Hung Nguyen, Nam Dan and many coastal hill communes in Quynh Luu are entering the season of picking "forest blessings". The job of collecting sim brings in 200,000-300,000 VND/day, which is a significant source of income for farmers during the off-season.

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 fruit to soak in wine, make syrup, make sim tea, etc. has increased sharply.

Recently, many people have come to the sim hills to "check-in", take photos and experience sim picking. This is also a trend to develop sim trees in the direction of eco-tourism. Photo: Nguyen Thanh

Realizing the economic value of this wild fruit, many localities have had plans to effectively protect and exploit sim trees; many households with large hill gardens have planted sim trees right under the forest canopy, earning an income of 3-5 million VND/ha. From there, opening updirection of converting crops under forest canopyIn many localities, local paint is sold…