Mr. Nguyen Van Cong and the journey to preserve the beauty of Hai Phong peach blossoms

For Mr. Nguyen Van Cong in An Hai ward (Hai Phong), each peach tree not only brings income but is also a way for him to preserve the traditional beauty of his hometown during each Tet holiday.

Mr. Nguyen Van Cong sprays nutrients to care for ancient peach trees.

Persevere in your career

Born into a family of long-standing peach growers in Hoa Nhat village, Dang Cuong commune, An Duong district (now An Hai ward, Hai Phong city), Nguyen Van Cong has been attached to peach trees since childhood. At the end of the year, when the whole village is busy preparing for Tet, his family is also busy taking care of the trees, stripping leaves, and bending branches. His love for peach trees has grown over the years...

Starting to build his own garden in 2000, Mr. Cong gradually expanded the area, accumulated experience from his ancestors and researched new techniques through the internet. With a peach garden area of ​​more than 1,500 ^m2 , Mr. Cong planted more than 150 ancient peach trees. He traveled all the way to the Northwest to buy and cross-breed the old peach trees with local peach buds to create a typical peach variety of Dong Du village. But peach growing has never been easy, requiring the worker to be careful, meticulous and persistent for many years to have peach trees blooming beautifully in time for Tet.

In 2024, Mr. Cong's peach garden suffered heavy damage due to storm No. 3 ( Yagi ). The storm hit the North, causing heavy rain that lasted for more than a week, causing his entire garden to be flooded for more than a week. More than 1/3 of the peach trees had to be removed due to waterlogging and root rot, and could not be restored.

“After the water receded, I went out to the garden and couldn’t hold back my tears. All the hard work and care I put into shaping the tree all year long, now all that’s left is a bare stump. There was a tree that I had just shaped and was planning to sell for Tet, but I had to throw it away,” Cong sadly recalled.

Not only natural disasters, the output of Tet peach blossoms is increasingly difficult. The general economic situation fluctuates, people tighten spending, many families cut down on playing with Tet peach blossoms or switch to renting instead of buying. Meanwhile, the price of agricultural materials such as fertilizers, pesticides, flower pots... is constantly increasing, causing investment costs to increase by one and a half times compared to before.

“It takes at least two years from planting to selling a peach tree, but the selling price has not increased, and has even decreased due to low demand, while all costs of growing peaches are more expensive. If you do not love the job, it will be difficult to stick with it,” Mr. Cong shared.

A large peach tree in Mr. Cong's garden was delivered to the buyer's facility for Tet.

However, he never once thought of giving up the job he had been attached to. Ms. Nguyen Thi Thao, Mr. Cong's wife, emotionally recounted: "After storm No. 3 in 2024, I discussed with my husband about changing to another business direction or working in an industrial park to make the hardship less difficult, but he shook his head because if no one kept the traditional job, it would disappear. He said so and then rolled up his sleeves and went to the garden to take care of the peach trees."

Not only taking care of his garden, Cong also supports many households in the area to continue the profession. Nguyen Xuan Chien, a close friend of Cong, shared: “Cong is an emotional person and has a lot of experience in growing peaches. Whenever anyone has difficulties, he is ready to help with techniques, seeds, and pesticides. Thanks to that, many households in the village can still keep the profession.”

Towards sustainable development

With over 20 years of experience in growing peach trees, Mr. Cong is not only a craftsman, but also a pioneer in innovating production thinking, gradually increasing the value of Tet peach trees. In recent years, instead of following short-term trends, he has focused all his efforts on the segment of ancient peach trees with large trunks - a high-end product line serving offices, offices, and villas in and outside the city.

Mr. Cong's peach garden seen from above.

According to Mr. Cong, the demand for Tet peach blossoms among customers with high aesthetic taste is increasing. They not only need a beautiful peach blossom branch but also want to own a work of art with cultural and feng shui values. Grasping that trend, he seriously invested in shaping, shaping, and applying peach blossom grafting techniques to create ancient peach trees with unique shapes, flowers that bloom evenly and have long-lasting colors.

Since the beginning of 2024, Mr. Cong has expanded the peach growing area with a garden house project in Moc Chau town (Son La) - a place with ideal climate and soil for growing peach trees with high quality flowers. With an area of ​​6,000 m², he has now planted more than 1,000 peach trees specializing in grafting flowers onto ancient peach trees in Hai Phong.

Sharing about the upcoming direction, Mr. Cong said: “I do not only want to grow peaches for sale but also want to build a Dong Du peach brand that has a firm position in the market. In the coming time, I will continue to expand links with households, standardize processes, and gradually bring the famous Dong Du peach products of the locality to major domestic markets.”

Mr. Nguyen Van Linh, Head of the Economic - Infrastructure and Urban Department of An Hai Ward, commented that in An Hai Ward, there are currently many farming households actively preserving and developing traditional occupations, thereby not only creating stable income but also contributing to increasing the value of crops and local products. Mr. Nguyen Van Cong is one of the typical households who has known how to promote the advantages of traditional occupations to do effective economic activities and get rich legitimately. The locality encourages, supports and replicates such models towards sustainable agricultural development, associated with preserving local cultural identity.

THANH TUNG

Source: https://baohaiphong.vn/anh-nguyen-van-cong-va-hanh-trinh-gin-giu-sac-dao-dat-cang-523220.html