Value of urban agricultural products enhanced

The province’s industrialization and urbanization process has created a shift of production structure, forming up new fields in line with the local area and workforce. The development of ornamental creature sector has contributed to increasing the value of the local urban agricultural products.

Bui Duc Dung’s apricot garden in Ben Cat town’s An Tay commune promises hi-economic efficiency

Diverse models

Nguyen Van Nghia in TDM city’s Phu Hoa ward now has 160 fish tanks with 5,000 “dia” fish (red discus fish).  After being breeding within 4 months, each “dia” fish is sold at between VND60,000-VND100,000.

Whilst, Bui Duc Dung in Ben Cat town’s An Tay commune has spent 8 years on growing apricot trees. His apricot garden has been expanded to more than 1.5 hectares with more than 3,000 trees.

With an area of nearly 1 hectare, Thanh Nam orchid garden in Ben Cat town’s Phu An commune now focus on 2 popular orchid kinds, namely mokara and dendrobium with more than 50 different varieties. Do Quang Hoan, the owner of Thanh Nam orchid garden said that his orchid garden has been developed since 2013 to collect, preserve, research and assess the effectiveness, production and business of tropical orchid varieties popularly grown in Vietnam, thereby creating the foundation for making an orchid development in the urban region.

Hi-economic efficiency

The province is now home to 10 clubs on ornamental creature with more than 500 members. There are also 50 facilities making various pots, supplying the market with more than one million products a year. It is known that the province’s ornamental creature sector has so far increased many times from 2013. Many households and members have changed to growing and trading in ornamental creature with large scale, forming up areas growing ornamental trees and flowers in TDM city, Thuan An city, Di An city, Ben Cat town and Tan Uyen town with more than 100 hectares. The sector’s annual revenue reaches more than VND50billion, actively contributing to the value of the local agriculture.

According to provincial Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, the province implemented many support policies for households getting involved in ornamental creature development with focus on training, improving workmanship for ornamental creature products with high artist value and economic efficiency. To promote the sector, provincial People’s Committee issued a project on “Formation of a specialized area on producing, supplying various creature varieties in the southern region of the province for the 2018-2022 period”. The project aims to create jobs for laborers, improving their income; take full advantage of existing resources to diversify agricultural products, creating the beauty of the urban region, contributing to dealing with people’s demand for entertainment. But, its major object is to raise the local area for growing and trading in ornamental creature to 139 hectares, including 70 hectares for orchid, 69 hectares for apricot, ornamental trees together with 2.9 million ornamental fish. The value of products collected on one hectare of urban and hi-tech agriculture will be between VND160million and VND180million per year. The figure from orchid, apricot and other ornamental trees will be between VND1.1billion and VND1.3billion per hectare per year. The average income per capita of farmers getting involved in urban agricultural production will be between VND70million and VND80million per year.

Le Canh Dan, Deputy Head of provincial Department of Agriculture and Rural Development said that the province’s southern urban economic region has many favorable conditions for the development of ornamental creature with high value. The economic efficiency from ornamental creature is very great with the annual income of VND600million per hectare per year. The figures are VND1.2billion for orchid growing per hectare, around VND800million for apricot growing per hectare; VND80million to VND1billion for per households with ornamental fish breeding.

Urban and hi-tech agriculture is oriented for the local agricultural development with ornament fish and plants having hi-economic efficiency and great market potential. Hence, the project on “Formation of a specialized area on producing, supplying various ornamental creature for the southern region for the 2018-2020 period is of great significance for the province to develop a sustainable and effective production sector.