Quy Chau: Risk of hunger after flash floods

(Baonghean) - Two months after the historic flood (September 14) in Quy Chau, the consequences are truly worrying. Many traffic infrastructure works, bridges, and houses have been damaged and cannot be repaired. Hundreds of hectares of agricultural land are buried in sand, rocks, and gravel, making it impossible to cultivate. The risk of hunger is beginning to appear.

Historic flood

Ms. Lu Thi Minh (56 years old), residing in Don village, Chau Hoi commune (Quy Chau), is still struggling to clean up the piles of rotten wood that were swept away by floodwaters to the foot of her house. Ms. Minh's garden, located next to the Tan stream, is littered with trash and wood. Her husband died early and her children went to work far away, so Ms. Minh had to fight alone against the flash flood that is considered the biggest ever in this locality. "The elders here all said that there had never been such a big flood. That night I slept soundly, and when I woke up this morning I saw white water, the scene was terrifying," Ms. Minh said with tears in her eyes.

Although it is harvest season, most of the rice growing area in Chau Hoi commune (Quy Chau) cannot be cultivated yet.

The floodwaters from Tan stream rose nearly ten meters high, reaching the edge of Mrs. Minh’s stilt house. Large trees were swept away by the water, hitting the pillars, making the house tilt, threatening to collapse. The single woman’s meager possessions, a flock of young ducks, were also swept away by the water.

After the flood, Mrs. Minh had to ask her neighbors to build a small temporary shack because her house was damaged. “I don’t dare go up to the house now for fear of it collapsing. After just one night, I’ve lost everything. The floodwaters have swept away everything,” the woman with a haggard face said, looking out at the fields that used to be rice fields, now turned into battlefields strewn with rocks and sand.

Like other people in these highland villages, Mrs. Minh only has a few acres of rice fields to grow rice, but if she is frugal, she can make ends meet. However, when the harvest day approaches, the rice fields she has spent months tending to are submerged in water.

When the water receded, Mrs. Minh hurriedly went to the field to collect some rice, but she could only find about ten kilos of it. According to her, the rice was inedible because most of it was young, flat, and mixed with rocks and gravel.

Ms. Lu Thi Minh in Don village, Chau Hoi commune (Quy Chau) only harvested 3 bags of young rice after the flood.

Meanwhile, in Chau Nga commune, sobbing in her small house, Ms. Le Thi Huong (40 years old) of Lien Minh village said that the flash flood nearly 2 months ago still haunts her in her sleep. The body of her husband, Mr. Vi Van Hai (44 years old), has not been found yet despite the efforts of the local authorities and family to search every tree and rock on the Mun stream. Ms. Huong said that the couple has been living together for 5 years, and because of their poor family background, they have not yet held a wedding ceremony.

To make a living, the couple had to go into the forest and build a hut for many days to pick bamboo shoots and bring them to the market to sell. At dawn on September 14, while sleeping in the hut, they saw the water rising, so they hurriedly packed up their belongings to flee. While wading through the stream, the floodwaters rushed in, and the woman was swept away first, but luckily she was able to cling to a large tree after drifting hundreds of meters, so she later survived and returned home.

As for Mr. Hai, it is unknown where he was carried by the floodwaters. As the main breadwinner in the family, Mr. Hai lives with his parents who are nearly 80 years old. His father, Mr. Vi Van Quyen, said that the rice in the family has run out and he does not know who he will depend on in the future.

Risk of hunger

Along the Tan and Mun streams in Chau Hoi and Chau Nga communes, most of the fields are buried under pebbles and sand. The rice fields here, which were once fertile, have become vast sandbanks after the flood; many rice fields have been covered with sand up to half a meter. Chau Nga is one of the poorest communes in Quy Chau district, with only over 50 hectares, but nearly 40 hectares have been submerged under sand and gravel due to the flood.

In Chau Hoi commune, flash floods destroyed more than 224 hectares of rice, corn and annual industrial crops; and after the flood, hundreds of hectares of rice fields were buried...

Chairman of Chau Nga Commune People's Committee, Mr. Luong Tri Dung, said that the winter-spring crop has not been able to be implemented yet even though it is past the harvest season. In addition, many irrigation and traffic systems have been damaged and have not been repaired yet.

“The sand has filled up the entire field, so it will take a long time to fix it. However, if all the sand is removed, the fertile part of the field will also be affected, and the yield of rice will not be high if we continue to grow rice,” said Mr. Dung.

According to the Chairman of the Chau Nga Commune People's Committee, the flash flood occurred during the "crop season", when the rice in the families had run out, so the consequences were even more serious. People were waiting to harvest, however, the flood swept everything away, causing hundreds of households to struggle, borrowing to eat each meal. After nearly 2 months, when the families with surplus rice in the commune also ran out of rice to lend, people had to go to other areas to rely on.

Many hectares of rice fields were covered with sand, making winter-spring crop production impossible.

Regarding the agricultural sector, according to Mr. Le Hai Ly - Head of the District's Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, the flash flood in the early morning of September 14 only lasted for a few hours but its consequences were extremely serious, nearly 750 hectares out of a total of 1,800 hectares of rice in the area were flooded, eroded or buried. Similarly, hundreds of hectares of corn, vegetables...

Mr. Le Hai Ly said: “The total estimated damage caused by the flood in Quy Chau is nearly 300 billion VND. However, those are only the immediate consequences. Because after the flood, hundreds of households are having to borrow money to eat every meal while the winter-spring crop cannot be cultivated yet…”.

According to the leader of Quy Chau district, faced with this difficult situation, the People's Committee of Quy Chau district on the one hand accurately reviewed the damages and reported to the province for support, and directed authorities at all levels to mobilize people to continue to care for and overcome the situation to harvest the remaining crops.

Prepare for winter-spring crop production for areas with less than 50% damage, while areas with more than 70% damage are converted to other crops, with the orientation of converting to growing corn for livestock. Integrate the 30a program, support corn seeds for people; in addition, plans are being made to repair 26 irrigation works so that people can soon produce agriculture.

Regarding the area of ​​agricultural land that has been completely buried, in addition to supporting the restoration costs for people according to regulations, it is proposed to return a part of the area of ​​the forestry farms that the province will reclaim to households.

Tien Hung - Ha Giang