Organic farming model brings in over 1 billion VND in income

Having worked in the education sector for 25 years, La Phu Thuan, hamlet 1, Khanh Thinh commune (Yen Mo) has a special passion for clean agriculture and organic agriculture. He has "temporarily put aside his teaching job", continued to pay social insurance from 2022 to pursue his passion for the land and producing clean food for the health of consumers.

Mr. Thuan has spent many years researching the organic agricultural model with the outstanding advantage of producing a clean product chain, meeting consumer demand. In 2020, Mr. Thuan decided to build a model of "Organic synthesis combined with natural processes operated in a circular manner to produce a clean product chain". After 2 years, Mr. Thuan's economic model has promoted high economic efficiency, generating an income of more than 1 billion VND/year. In 2022, Mr. La Phu Thuan was awarded a Certificate of Merit by the Chairman of the Provincial People's Committee for his outstanding achievements in production and business in the period 2020 - 2022.

Mr. La Phu Thuan shared: Worried about developing the family economy, I researched new, clean economic models. In 2015 - 2016, I researched the American organic model and the Japanese natural model on the Internet, realizing that clean food is becoming more and more popular as the country develops. Therefore, I traveled to many places, learned and gained experience in production and breeding methods to apply. From practical experience, I considered choosing to grow Thai taro for shoots and raise natural aquatic products suitable for the soil conditions of my homeland.

In early 2020, Mr. Thuan built a green agricultural model, initially renting 3 sao of low-lying rice fields from farmers, buying Thai taro seedlings and snails for testing. Thanks to the correct implementation of safe and organic production processes, the taro area grew and developed well. After more than 3 months of planting and caring, the taro plants began to yield the first harvests. After 6 months, the taro plants gave quite high efficiency and were much higher than the traditional rice cultivation before.

With the support of his family and local authorities, the Department of Science and Technology supported 5,000 potato plants, Mr. Thuan continued to mobilize people to lease land long-term to expand the model. By November 2021, the total potato growing area had increased to 4.2 hectares. Currently, Mr. Thuan is completing a synthetic organic model combined with natural farming that is operated in a circular manner to produce a chain of clean products such as: Potato shoots, snails, grass carp, shrimp, crab, loach, banana fish, pigs, chickens, squash, luffa, etc.

Teacher passionate about organic farming model — Mr. La Phu Thuan introduced the model to the leaders of the Farmers' Association of Yen Mo district.

Referring to the Thai sweet taro plant, a plant that is popular with many customers, Mr. Thuan said: This plant has shoots that are not itchy, plump, high yield, suitable for planting in low-lying fields, with few pests and diseases, low seed cost and not requiring much care. Thai taro shoots have a delicious, sweet flavor, can be processed into many dishes such as cooking with rice, cooking with bones, cooking with snails, stir-frying, salad... the product is very popular with customers.

In order to preserve and meet the diverse needs of customers, Mr. Thuan has invested in building a factory to process prepackaged potato shoots. Currently, on average, Mr. Thuan sells 1-1.2 quintals of potato shoots to the market every day at a stable price of 20-25 thousand VND/kg raw, 35-40 thousand VND/kg processed.

To bring the model's clean products to a large number of customers, Mr. Thuan has kept up with the development of digital technology, through sales methods on social networking sites such as Facebook, Zalo, Thai taro shoots are not only popular in the provincial market, but also exported to many provinces and cities across the country such as Hanoi, Hai Phong, Quang Ninh...

With a safe production process, following the natural cycle around the area of 4.2 hectares of potato plants, under the potato trenches are shrimp, crab, perch, crucian carp, traditional snails..., Mr. Thuan has used by-products from potato plants such as tubers, leaves plus mixed fish meal through processing as food for animals such as snails, pigs, chickens, fish... In which, snails are raised completely naturally on the potato field with an area of about 1.5 hectares, releasing about 2 million young animals. Other animals are integrated by area.

Mr. Thuan's economic model generates an income of over 1 billion VND/year; creates stable jobs for 6 regular workers and 3-4 seasonal workers, with a salary of 4-5 million VND/person/month. The model is also a reputable address providing potato seeds and sharing experiences and methods for neighboring localities in and outside the province.

In 2022, Mr. Thuan's family's taro shoot product was recognized as a 3-star OCOP product. The model has received attention from all levels, sectors and many farmers inside and outside the province to visit, share and learn from experiences. Not stopping at the current success, Mr. Thuan set a goal in 2023, striving to collect about 10 tons of commercial snails and sell a large number of young snails to the market; raise clean wild boars using taro by-products; strive to achieve revenue of 800 million VND/ha, aiming to do tourism from the existing model to preserve the beauty of agricultural culture, promote the image of Khanh Thinh land and people. At the same time, Mr. Thuan is cherishing the plan to allocate part of the profit from business to set up a Scholarship Fund for the homeland, supporting poor students to overcome difficulties, continuing their love for education.

Comrade La Thi Anh Dao, President of the Farmers' Association of Khanh Thinh Commune, said: With the success of Mr. Thuan's family economic model, the Farmers' Association of the Commune has advised the Commune People's Committee to create favorable conditions for land for his family to continue developing the model. Propaganda for people with ineffective rice fields to rent to Mr. Thuan to expand the model. At the same time, promote propaganda on Facebook, Zalo of the Association and the Electronic Information page of the Commune to promote Thai taro shoots to a large number of members and people, promote the market for product consumption...

Article and photos: Phuong Anh

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