Quynh Minh: Increasing productivity and value of vegetables after "converting" land

(Baonghean) - Farmers in Quynh Minh commune (Quynh Luu) have a tradition of growing vegetables. After implementing land consolidation according to Directive 08 of the Provincial Party Committee, Quynh Minh's land not only creates high productivity and output of commercial vegetables, but people have also imported high-quality vegetable varieties from other provinces for intensive cultivation, creating a variety of products to serve market demand.

The Quynh Minh fields are green with spring onions, cabbage, kohlrabi and sweet cabbage these days. During the recent heavy rains, the vegetables still grow well and are not waterlogged thanks to the well-planned and renovated internal irrigation system, which is connected to a 4-6m wide road system, making it convenient for machinery to be used in production and product consumption.

Farmers in Quynh Minh commune (Quynh Luu) take care of and harvest vegetables.

Mr. Hoang Van Tuan, Chairman of the Commune People's Committee, said: The reality in Quynh Minh proves that land consolidation and encouraging farmers to accumulate land to develop large-scale production in agriculture, implementing industrialization and modernization of rural agriculture is a correct policy that is popular with the people, in line with the trend of multi-sector economic development. After land consolidation and plot exchange, it has created favorable conditions for specializing in the production of commodity vegetables, gradually shifting the agricultural labor structure to develop other occupations in the direction of reassigning labor "whoever is good at what job does what job". Being a commune with a small land area and a large population, the average agricultural land per capita is very low, only 330m2/person, previously each household had an average of 5.9 plots, fragmented land, ineffective production, the internal irrigation system has not been planned, the land has been abandoned for a long time and has become "dead" land.

After Directive 08 was issued, the Party Committee Standing Committee focused on directing and thoroughly disseminating the directive to each party member and to all people, thereby contributing ideas to build the commune's land consolidation and plot exchange project; considering this an important and extensive political activity for cadres and people to contribute ideas to build a project that closely linked economic interests to each household. The political system from the commune down to the hamlets really got involved, mobilizing its union members, exemplary party members and cadres to take the lead in the campaign, creating high consensus among the people so that the commune could successfully organize the implementation of land consolidation and plot exchange. After land consolidation and plot exchange, the whole commune had 3,239 plots left, a reduction of 2,436 plots (a reduction of 43.7%), the land was zoned for convenient cultivation and care, convenient for care and harvesting. The commune has restructured more than 100 hectares of specialized vegetable land, rotating 3-4 crops per year, with an average yield of 22 tons/ha/crop, annual output of over 10,000 tons of various vegetables, the agricultural income value is 45.4 billion VND, accounting for 38.4% of the total income value of the whole commune, people's lives have been improved, the cultivated area is closed, the fields are re-planned with irrigation canal systems. In particular, the canal system is basically concreted, so despite the recent heavy rainfall, it is still drained very well.

With state and local budget capital, the commune has built dozens of kilometers of concrete ditches, 3 transformer stations with a capacity of 275KVA and unloaded dozens of kilometers of power grid from 0.2kv - 0.4kv to serve production. The total investment value for the irrigation system in the whole commune is tens of billions of VND. In addition, people have invested their own capital to build nearly 2,000 wells and drilled wells to proactively source irrigation water. Many households have the initiative to invest tens of millions of VND to build automatic misting irrigation systems, freeing up labor and saving production costs. In particular, after the Land Law came into effect, the land was granted by the State for an additional term, people were really confident in investing in intensive farming to increase crop productivity, focusing on improving the fields with thousands of working days and bringing hundreds of cubic meters of sand to improve clay fields; The previously abandoned area has now been restored and put into use, the land has become fertile, thanks to which crop productivity has increased significantly. Previously, the average income value per hectare was 100 million VND, then 150 million VND, but now many fields have reached more than 200 million VND/ha/year. Hundreds of Quynh Minh farming households have become rich by working hard on the fields that the state has given them the right to use.

However, with the current trend of vegetable development, the commune is mobilizing people to supplement the crop structure, diversify the types of vegetables with high economic value, and make a breakthrough in bringing beans, peas, celery, and leeks into intensive cultivation... to supply the market, to continuously increase the economic value per unit area. Mr. Ho Dien Vy, Chairman of the Commune Farmers' Association, added: "Currently, the Farmers' Association is building a pilot model of growing okra on sandy soil. The advantages of this variety are short season, high yield, and the product is popular in the markets of provinces and Hanoi city. This variety was previously grown in the southern provinces, but through research on the characteristics of okra, it is similar to some beans grown in the North. The advantage is that the economic value is quite high compared to many other local varieties. If the model is successful, this will be a new direction for the local agricultural sector."

Although there are still many difficulties, with a team of experienced cadres, sharp thinking, grasping the market mechanism, combined with the diligence and creativity of farmers, it will be a lever to promote the economy of the commune and promote efficiency after land consolidation in the spirit of Directive 08 of the Provincial Party Standing Committee in the coming years.

Pham Huu Hon

(People's Committee of Quynh Minh Commune - Quynh Luu)