The desolate rotation

(Baonghean) - News reports indicate that farmers in some southern provinces are cutting down cashew, coffee, and even rubber trees to switch to growing pepper. This is because the current selling price of pepper is very high, over 200,000 VND per kilogram. But that's the current price. Will the price remain high once the pepper plants bear fruit? Or will the price drop, forcing them to cut down the trees again to pursue other crops with higher prices?

So, to this day, our farmers are still trapped in a vicious cycle of planting, cutting down, planting again, and cutting down again. Whenever a crop or animal yields higher value, the whole village rushes in to raise or cultivate it. Then, when there's an oversupply of produce, they throw it all away. Countless times our farmers have had to tearfully cut down cashew trees to plant coffee. Then coffee to cocoa. Cocoa to rubber. Rubber to pepper, then cashew. And now, cashew to pepper. The farmers' money and sweat are wasted in this vicious cycle for years, with no way to stop it. And so today, farmers, the most hardworking and resilient class, are also the most impoverished. Looking back, it seems that, both in the past and present, farmers are still primarily left to fend for themselves. When it comes to deciding what crops to grow or what livestock to raise effectively, they have to figure it out on their own, learning from each other, and mostly following trends. If they see someone else growing a certain crop or raising a certain animal and making a good profit, they rush to do the same.Farmers produce goods but don't know where to sell them, and are dependent on traders. They accept being exploited in every way because if they don't sell to them, they have nowhere else to sell. In mid-November, farmers in Ca Mau had to burn entire sugarcane fields because there were no buyers when it was time for harvest. After months of sweat and tears in the fields, all they got was piles of black, acrid ash. How heartbreaking!

I remember a time when many people, when speaking to farmers, would say, "What crops should we plant, what livestock should we raise for efficiency?" But no one could specify what to raise or what crops to grow. Nor could anyone tell farmers where to sell their produce. Then, after a while, that familiar phrase disappeared, replaced by calls to promote livestock farming and commodity production. They said this was in line with the new rural development program. But still, no one mentioned where to sell the finished products. Suppose every commune did this well, how would they consume the mountain of produce that would pile up, or would they have to throw it away like cabbage, tomatoes, and watermelons during peak season? Let's hold meetings and discuss, but let's stop talking about these abstract, lofty matters and instead vote on concrete issues that benefit the people and the country. Like ending that vicious cycle. First they cut down pepper plants to grow cashew trees, now they're cutting down cashew trees to grow pepper. And soon it will be the same again... How can we help farmers escape this vicious cycle of pepper and cashew cultivation?

Confidant