Passing through Long Xuyen Quadrangle field

New vitality in the Long Xuyen Quadrangle. Photo: THANH CHINH

A time in the wilderness

From Rach Gia, we followed Highway 80 and asked the locals for directions to Tam Ngan Canal. Crossing the sturdy concrete bridge in Binh Son Commune, we stopped to ask for directions to Tri Ton. Near the Tam Ngan Bridge slope, there is a “0 Dong” vegetarian restaurant serving everyone freely. Next to it, we saw people grinding and sawing iron to prepare to build charity houses for the poor.

Among them was Mr. Ut Gach (60 years old), residing in Hon Dat commune, who came here with the people to support money to buy materials, iron, and steel. Mr. Ut Gach looked simple even though his family had 100 hectares of rice fields. He humbly said: "In this area, people think that saying 100 hectares of land is bragging, it is not worth it compared to many farmers cultivating thousands of hectares of rice fields." Mr. Ut Gach said that at that time, this area was deserted, the fields were red with alum, and eucalyptus trees could not survive. The land was given away for free but no one wanted to accept it, many people came to reclaim it and then left because of the alum.

Later, the State invested in cutting horizontal and vertical canals on the quadrangle alum fields. Farmers dug ditches, canals, pumped water into the fields and then discharged the alum into the canals. During the flood season, water from upstream flows into Vinh Te canal and then carries alluvium through canals T4, T5 (Vo Van Kiet canal), T6. In addition, canals connecting from Hau river such as: Dao canal, Can Thao canal, Vinh Tre canal, Chau Phu canal... receive a large amount of alluvium into the Long Xuyen quadrangle to effectively remove alum. Standing on the bank of Tam Ngan canal at noon, we saw people releasing floodwaters into fields that had just been harvested for about a month. Tractors were rumbling on the fields to plow and clean the fields in preparation for the winter-spring crop.

Mr. Ut Gach, from Chau Phu area, started his career in the quadrangle field in 1991. At that time, the land in this area was gradually becoming less acidic, so he could only grow seasonal rice. Later, thanks to the farmers' alkaline removal techniques, each crop yielded from 700kg - 1 ton/cong. Over the years, Mr. Ut Gach has established himself in this alkaline field and continued to cultivate rice to become prosperous. Now that his life is stable, he and his fellow villagers have contributed to the locality to build houses for the poor.

Tam Ngan Canal is bustling with boats and ships carrying agricultural products and machinery for agriculture in the Long Xuyen Quadrangle. Photo: THANH CHINH

Many people succeed

The Long Xuyen Quadrangle is a shortened area of land with 4 peaks being urban areas such as: Long Xuyen, Chau Doc, Ha Tien and Rach Gia. The area has a natural area of 498,141 hectares, including: An Giang is 483,141 hectares and a part of Can Tho City is 15,000 hectares. This is an area with natural terrain with elevation gradually decreasing from north to south.

When mentioning the Long Xuyen Quadrangle field, Mr. Bay Nhi (Nguyen Minh Nhi - former Chairman of the People's Committee of the old An Giang province) knows this area of acid sulfate soil by heart. Mr. Bay Nhi only teaches simple acid sulfate removal techniques. Just dig a canal to bring in fresh water to remove acid sulfate soil and grow rice, without the need to use base fertilizer. Recalling the past, Mr. Bay Nhi said that this area was completely barren, deserted and very few people lived there. After that, the State had a policy to attract people to reclaim and open up land, each person was given 3 hectares.

“Thanks to preferential policies, farmers flocked to the new economic zone to reclaim land and start a business. At that time, Mr. Khanh Linh and I advised on the policy of digging the T5 canal, which was approved by the late Prime Minister Vo Van Kiet. In 1996, this canal was started. After 3 years, the T5 canal was completed, bringing water from Vinh Te canal to sweeten the entire alum field area. The State continued to approve the policy of digging the T4 and T6 canals to remove alum from the entire Long Xuyen Quadrangle,” said Mr. Bay Nhi.

Farmers in the Long Xuyen Quadrangle cultivate rice with high productivity. Photo: THANH CHINH

Passing the cable-stayed suspension bridges across the canal, we went deep into the fields of Hon Dat and Binh Giang communes and then upstream the Vo Van Kiet canal. The once remote area is now paved with concrete roads for vehicles to drive to. The rice fields here are large, people calculate them by the "hundred horizontal, thousand vertical" method, meaning 100m wide and 1,000m long. Currently, the banks of the fields are built high by farmers to facilitate large-scale rice cultivation and vehicles to drive right to the fields.

I met Mr. Dao Van Kha (45 years old), originally from Cho Vam commune, who has been working in the Long Xuyen Quadrangle for nearly 10 years. He is an agricultural engineer, boldly going to remote areas to build a company distributing pesticides and fertilizers to serve farmers. Mr. Kha also rents land to grow rice, increasing his income. Mr. Kha said that in recent years, there have been times when rice prices have increased and then decreased continuously, but thanks to the high productivity of rice fields in this area, he has made a profit and continued to reinvest in production. Many farmers have had a good harvest, saved money to buy hundreds to thousands of hectares of land, and have become rich and famous in the region. "Specifically, Mr. Long, Mr. Binh, Mr. Bay Phan, Sau Duc, Mr. Kieu, Mr. Be Nam, each of them has thousands of hectares of rice fields, everyone knows them," Mr. Kha said.

Now, passing through the Long Xuyen Quadrangle, you will encounter densely populated hamlets with rice fields stretching as far as the eye can see, which are important food suppliers for the whole country.

THANH CHINH

Source: https://baoangiang.com.vn/di-qua-canh-dong-tu-giac-long-xuyen-a464933.html