The story of buying a hundred billion dong property of Sa Dec bonsai artist

On nice days, the bonsai garden of Mr. Nguyen Phuoc Loc (53 years old, living in Sa Dec city, Dong Thap province) welcomes hundreds of visitors. The 3-hectare garden has more than 5,000 valuable bonsai trees.

Most notably, Mr. Loc's garden is displaying and taking care of three works including ancient bonsai trees, a pair of ancient tamarinds, and a pair of ancient cypress trees that have been recognized as Vietnamese records.

To have a fortune worth hundreds of billions, Mr. Loc worked hard for 30 years (Photo: Nguyen Cuong).

The pair of tamarinds that were recognized as the oldest bonsai in Vietnam in 2013, someone offered 10 billion VND but Mr. Loc did not sell. The pair of tamarinds are 6m high, with a cone-shaped canopy 3.5m in diameter, and a four-sided landscape. Mr. Loc spent a lot of effort to bring the pair of tamarinds to the garden.

"The most valuable in the garden is the pair of ancient tamarinds, I value them at exactly 1 million USD. There are many trees worth billions, and there are over a thousand trees worth 10 million VND or more," said Mr. Loc.

Mr. Loc shared that growing up in the famous Sa Dec flower village, he was familiar with taking care of ornamental plants from a young age. From the age of 16, Mr. Loc started working as a professional ornamental plant repairman, using his wages to pay for his education.

The pair of ancient bonsai trees that set a Vietnamese record was valued by Mr. Loc at exactly 1 million USD (Photo: Nguyen Cuong).

In 1992, after graduating from university in Ho Chi Minh City, although he had the opportunity to work as a desk worker, his love for bonsai repair brought Mr. Loc back to his hometown. Mr. Loc began to seriously learn the bonsai repair profession. Not only did he learn the profession from acquaintances and study in the province, Mr. Loc also went to study in gardens throughout the country, even to Japan, Taiwan (China), and Thailand.

"Japan has a university training system specializing in bonsai, so I learned a lot there. If you want to be good at this profession, you have to study, socialize, and invest seriously," said Mr. Loc.

In addition to the exhibition facility, Mr. Loc also has a 2.6-hectare ornamental plant nursery to provide his own source of seedlings. In the two gardens, there are many types of ornamental plants, but the most popular is the cypress.

Mr. Loc's two gardens are creating stable jobs for more than 20 local workers with a salary of about 9 million VND per month.

With daily care and pruning, a cypress tree can be worth hundreds of millions of dong after 10 years (Photo: Nguyen Cuong).

Mr. Loc said that a cypress tree needs to be cared for for about 7 years before it can be sold for millions of dong. During those 7 years, the grower must look at and care for it every day.

"If you let the tree grow naturally, the price won't be high, only 5-7 million VND. If you want the tree to be worth tens or even hundreds of millions of VND, you have to put in a lot of effort in pruning it.

Sa Dec people have a saying "growing flowers is ten times more profitable than growing rice, growing ornamental plants is ten times more profitable than growing flowers". That said, it is not "easy to eat", to have a valuable ornamental plant requires a lot of effort.

"Growing ornamental plants is calculated by years, so calculating each tree does not bring much profit. In return, gardeners can grow thousands of trees at the same time, making up for the quantity," said Mr. Loc.

When asked about the value of the bonsai garden, Mr. Loc smiled and said "definitely over a hundred billion". The artist said that to be considered a "Sa Dec bonsai tycoon", over the past 30 years, he has continuously learned, innovated and always worked hard.

Mr. Loc is currently one of the few people in Dong Thap who is recognized as a national Bonsai artist. With his prestige, he was elected and held the position of Chairman of the Bonsai Association of Sa Dec City for many years.

Source link: https://dantri.com.vn/lao-dong-viec-lam/chuyen-tau-co-ngoi-tram-ty-cua-nghe-nhan-bonsai-sa-dec-20230917082448745.htm