Finding ways to consume agricultural specialties of the Ky Son highlands

Struggling to find a way to sell

Living in Trung Tam village, Nam Can commune, for more than 10 years now, Tho Ba Phong's family has received 3 sao of Shan Tuyet tea from the Youth Volunteer Force 8 to take care of, harvest and import products for sale to the team. There are 2 harvests per month, and Phong and his wife collect 11-12 quintals of fresh tea. "Due to the good climate and soil, the tea plants almost do not need to be fertilized or cared for, and are completely "clean" and delicious tea. "Previously, the team purchased the tea at 6,000 VND/kg, which increased to 9,000 VND/kg last year. The tea is picked and imported immediately without worrying about it being unsold," Tho Ba Phong said.

Every month, Tho Ba Phong and his wife harvest 11-12 quintals of Shan snow tea. Photo: Phu Huong

Located in Huoi Tu commune, up to now, the Youth Union 8 is responsible for purchasing Shan Tuyet tea products for over 230 hectares of tea in Huoi Tu and Muong Long communes. Mr. Vi Van Khanh - Head of Organization and Administration Department said: The tea area of ​​the unit is 30 hectares, and in recent years, it has deployed for people to plant over 200 hectares more, with an average new planting area of ​​20-30 hectares per year. Currently, 170 hectares of tea have been and are being harvested, with an output of hundreds of tons per year.

Picked by hand, not by machine, Ky Son snow shan tea is a plant that has been grown for a long time in this land, very suitable for soil and climate conditions, and is the main livelihood of people in the region.

Due to the difficulty of building and promoting the product, the team is only a socio-political organization, carrying out the task of propagating and mobilizing people to grow tea, so the unit has linked up with a number of businesses to support,product promotion and consumptionmore widely, bringing the Ky Son Shan Tuyet tea brand to consumers nationwide. “In addition, we also pay great attention to solutions to research the market, connect, and work with consumers to find stable consumption sources, and increase the value of tea trees. Thanks to that, despite many difficulties, over the years, the unit has always ensured to purchase all products for people; in addition, the price of tea has increased since last year, some newly planted areas have been neglected, and people are now focusing on taking care of and restoring them,” Mr. Vi Van Khanh shared.

Officers of Youth Volunteer Team 8 - Ky Son check the quality of tea before processing. Photo: Phu Huong

Not only selling raw tea, the team also invested in tea production lines, packaging, labeling, the unit has many times participated inagricultural fairto introduce, promote and expand the consumer market.

However, not all products are consumed quite stably like Shan Tuyet tea. There are over 50 plum trees in his family's garden, every year, when the season comes, Mr. Ho Chong Po in Muong Long 2 village, Muong Long commune (Ky Son) can harvest tons of plums, traders come to the garden to buy. However, consumption is not always favorable. Mr. Po said that in the past few years, he could not sell, this year after the Covid-19 epidemic, he sold more, especially when the State organized a plum fair, many customers came to the garden to buy. But he only sold more than half. Many trees were not sold in time, the fruit fell off.

Not only Mr. Po's family, the whole Muong Long commune has 23 hectares of plums, each year producing approximately hundreds of tons of fruit, but according to Mr. Lau Ba Cho - Vice Chairman of the Commune People's Committee, people can only sell 30 - 50% of the output, the rest must be left to fall and rot even though the price of plums in the middle and end of the season is very low.

Mr. Ho Chong Po said: Every year, his family's plum garden only consumes more than half of the fruit output. Photo: Phu Huong

Ms. Vo Thi Nhung - Deputy Director of the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development shared: This is very unfortunate because it is very difficult to find a tree that is suitable for both climate conditions, soil as well as farming practices of the people, and can be as effective as Tam Hoa plum. We have conducted a survey, assigned specialized units to study related factors to conduct new planting of some areas according to VietGAP process, with proper investment in care; from those models, we will replicate them, helping people to improve productivity and especially the quality of plum products, with bigger, crispier and sweeter fruits, thereby making it easier to find a stable consumption direction.

Not only Tam Hoa plum products, but many other agricultural specialties of Ky Son district, although of very high quality and food safety due to characteristics of care, soil quality, and climate, are still in a state of unstable consumption, prices sometimes drop very low or even become unsold.

Ky Son ginger is delicious and has mature roots, but its consumption is always in a "fluctuating" state. Photo: Xuan Hoang's document

After 2 years of being affected by the Covid-19 epidemic, since this year, the consumption of agricultural products has gradually regained its "orbit", but it is still very difficult. Ginger prices have dropped to their peak. Previously, during the ginger season, every day there were 2-3 container trucks transporting Ky Son ginger to consume in all provinces, exporting to China and Middle Eastern countries for processing; but up to now, the price of ginger is only 5,000 VND/kg, 1/5 of the previous price, and there are still nearly 4 tons of ginger left in the area, after efforts to "rescue", mobilize businesses, connect mass organizations and society toconsumption supportproducts for people

There needs to be a stable and sustainable connection.

According to Mr. Pham Van Manh - Chairman of the District Farmers' Association, the most difficult part is the transportation route. Not only is the distance from major traffic routes and urban areas such as Vinh city to Ky Son very far, but from Muong Xen town to other communes is also very long, the terrain is mountainous, so traders are reluctant to buy because of the difficulty in transportation, increasing costs. There have even been businesses that have come to Ky Son to survey for purchasing and processing but have given up due to the difficulty in transportation.

Over the past years, the district has had many solutions to call on businesses and find a way to consume products for people, but up to now, there has not been any business in the area to connect, support, process and consume products.

As a mountainous district of the province, with a large land area, temperate and cool climate, large temperature difference between day and night, and farming practices of the people, Ky Son district has many types of clean, delicious agricultural specialties, extremely popular with consumers. In addition to Tam Hoa plum products grown on an area of ​​up to hundreds of hectares in the communes of Muong Long, Tay Son, Ta Ca, Na Ngoi, Nam Can..., Ky Son district also has pumpkin, ginger, taro, Mong cucumber, Shan snow tea... Each year, the plum output is about 100 - 120 tons, from 1,300 - 1,400 tons of taro, over 5,000 tons of ginger and turmeric.

Agricultural products of Ky Son district. Photo: Nghe An Newspaper documents

According to Mr. Pham Van Manh, if consumed, each year Ky Son district can produce tens of thousands of tons of cucumbers, Tam Hoa plums, ginger... To be able to increase product value, create stable consumption, in addition to solutions like the TNXP8 Team has done, linking production, processing and consumption is still considered the most effective solution, both in the short term and long term. In fact, with the current price, one ton of fresh ginger sold, people earn from 5-5.6 million VND without deducting costs, but if processed and pressed for essential oil, one ton of ginger can be pressed to produce 2.7-2.8 liters of essential oil, with a price of 4 million VND/liter, the value will be up to over 10 million VND. If dried, 7 tons of fresh ginger will produce one ton of dried ginger, sold for 47-48 million VND, without incurring transportation costs.

Or with taro products, taro powder is a raw material for making ham, if businesses invest in linking consumption or processing, it will increase the value and the output will be more stable; or cucumber products sold in Muong Xen are only 5,000 - 12,000 VND/kg, if brought to supermarkets they will be sold for 25,000 VND/kg...

In recent times, Ky Son district has made efforts to connect, promote, introduce and bring products to participate in agricultural fairs; some products such as ginger have been recognized as OCOP products, have geographical indications and are currently continuing to build OCOP products for some other products such as plums, beef, black chicken, etc.

Linking production and product consumption is a suitable direction to increase the value of Ky Son agricultural products. Photo: Nghe An Newspaper

However, according to Mr. Tho Ba Re - Vice Chairman of the People's Committee of Ky Son district, in order for local specialty agricultural products to have a solid position, increase product value, income and life of people in mountainous areas, it is necessary to have more support from the State, calling on businesses to accompany the locality, creatinglinkstability in production and product consumption; and especially, the efforts of the locality and people in applying advanced production processes, creating a concentrated, quality source of products, meeting market requirements.