The guy who brought lemongrass abroad

Mr. An grows lemongrass on an area of ​​20 hectares.

Taking us on a tour of the vast, lush lemongrass plantation, Mr. An shared his enthusiasm and knowledge of this crop. Mr. An said that he was born and raised in an area where people mainly grow oranges. Since childhood, Mr. An has been troubled by seeing many people with unstable incomes from farming , suffering from traders forcing down prices.

Growing up, An studied business administration, then decided to go to Japan to work to earn capital and gain experience. He always had the desire to return to start a business, get rich on his homeland, and create jobs for his people. Realizing that agricultural products grown in abundance in his homeland, even abandoned, were very popular abroad and had high value. Among them, lemongrass stood out because it was easy to grow and had a stable source of goods, so he always cherished starting a business with this plant.

"Although I chose to work abroad, I always cherished the idea of ​​getting rich from agriculture in my homeland. During many years in Japan, I knew that lemongrass here is expensive not only in the Japanese, Korean and European markets. From there, I decided to choose lemongrass to research and grow when I returned home," said Mr. An. In 2019, he decided to pool his savings after many years of working to rent 20 hectares of land to grow lemongrass in Binh Tan district ( Vinh Long province). After that, he established a company to create a value chain of products from lemongrass.

At first, Mr. An's entrepreneurial journey was also full of hardships, and he received a lot of criticism when he decided to choose a different direction, growing lemongrass right in the "capital" of sweet potatoes, Binh Tan. At first, he encountered difficulties in output, tons of harvested lemongrass that could not be sold had to be thrown away, countless. To solve the difficulties, he had to travel to all the main points inside and outside the province to find an output for the lemongrass. Thanks to his perseverance and quality sources, he found a stable output for his agricultural products. Currently, in addition to supplying nearly 2 tons of lemongrass to the domestic market every day, he also cooperates with a number of companies to export to the European, Japanese, and Malaysian markets... from 5-10 tons of lemongrass per month. The exported lemongrass all meet very strict criteria on size, hygiene, packaging, and packaging. Thanks to that, Mr. An has a good source of income.

"For the domestic market, my facility has met some basic markets in the markets in the Southwest region. As for exports, I still aim to export large quantities, currently only accepting processing and exporting small quantities to foreign markets," said Mr. An.

Realizing that lemongrass when harvested and sold to the market is still not fully utilized, when a large amount of lemongrass leaves are discarded. Mr. An boldly researched the direction of producing lemongrass essential oil. Currently, Mr. An's facility also contributes to solving the problem of employment for more than 100 idle workers in the locality. In the near future, Mr. An hopes to expand the lemongrass growing area to 15 hectares. From there, stabilize the market for raw lemongrass. At the same time, he strives to build more conditions to expand the production of processed products from lemongrass, such as dried lemongrass, lemongrass shavings, lemongrass essential oil to diversify the products supplied to the market and increase the value of lemongrass.

Ms. Nguyen Ngoc Xuan (65 years old, living in Binh Tan district) said that due to her old age, it was difficult for her to find a job to earn an income. Luckily, Mr. An hired her to work, she was in charge of cutting and washing lemongrass, helping her earn more than 120,000 VND/day.

Article and photos: NGUYEN TRINH

Source: https://baocantho.com.vn/chang-trai-dua-cay-sa-xuat-ngoai-a186203.html