(QNO) - After 5 years of hard work, the couple Nguyen Van Dat and Nguyen Thi Hien have expanded their bamboo rat breeding model to become the Tra My Bamboo Rat Breeding, Development and Trading Cooperative - Dai Quang Agriculture and Forestry (Tra My Bamboo Rat Cooperative), providing output for other households in the two districts of Bac Tra My and Nam Tra My.
From the will to overcome difficulties
Tra My bamboo rat cooperative is located on Nguyen Thi Minh Khai street in Tra My town (Bac Tra My) with an area of 1,400m2 . This is the establishment after more than 5 years of building by Mr. Nguyen Van Dat and his wife Ms. Nguyen Thi Hien. According to Mr. Dat, he is not the first person to raise this "special" animal, but raising it commercially in large quantities is very difficult and many people have failed.
The only advantage for Mr. Dat and his wife to pursue the model of raising bamboo rats is that the food for them is easy to find, cheap and useful plants. Accordingly, elephant grass, potatoes, sugarcane, corn or bamboo from the mountains and forests are available in this land, helping to save on the cost of animal feed when starting a business.
At the same time, to have "capital" for starting a business, Mr. Dat and his wife learned knowledge and gained experience from successful bamboo rat farming models and on the internet.
“The biggest difficulty in raising bamboo rats is controlling their diseases and body temperature. Among them, digestive and respiratory diseases are the main causes of the largest population decline. Only through failures can we gain practical experience in raising bamboo rats,” said Nguyen Van Dat.
According to Mr. Dat's experience, in winter, when the temperature drops sharply, straw is always prepared to keep the bamboo rats warm. In hot weather, when the temperature is high, a cooling fan system must be used to keep the bamboo rats' body temperature stable at 25 - 30 degrees Celsius.
In addition, bamboo rats have the habit of digging the ground, living in caves, preferring darkness and quiet, so Mr. Nguyen Van Dat and his wife also limit direct light on the farm, only use dim lights when feeding and avoid disturbances due to noise.
Up to now, the 400m2 cage of Mr. Dat and his wife has more than 100 breeding rats and bamboo rats raised for meat. Of which, 70% are female, 30% are male, the appropriate number for each male to be paired with 2 females. To ensure the health of the mother, instead of letting the bamboo rats give birth 3 litters/year like many other farms, Mr. Dat chose to breed them so that they can only give birth twice a year.
According to Mr. Dat, each breeding period, a mother rat gives birth to at least 3-4 babies, and at most 5-7 babies. Each breeding pair costs 3.5 million VND, while commercial rats cost 500,000 VND/kg. Thus, each time they are sold, they will make a profit of about 20-30 million VND.
[ VIDEO ] - Tra My bamboo rat cooperative of Mr. Nguyen Van Dat and his wife:
Forming a livestock chain
The business development of Tra My bamboo rat cooperative not only creates income for the family of Mr. Nguyen Van Dat but also supports the output of bamboo rat breeding households in the two districts of Bac Tra My and Nam Tra My. Thanks to the reputable business and good quality of bamboo rat products, traders in the southern provinces such as Ho Chi Minh City, Binh Duong , and Dong Nai always place orders with Tra My bamboo rat cooperative.
On average, the market needs about 100kg of commercial bamboo rats every 2 to 3 weeks. To stabilize the supply, Mr. Dat and his wife buy bamboo rats from members of the cooperative as well as other breeding households. Up to now, there are 10 sources in Bac Tra My and Nam Tra My that are in charge of purchasing and when there are about 100 - 200 bamboo rats, they are exported to the South.
Mr. Nguyen Duc Dung (Tra Giap commune, Bac Tra My) said: “Dui is a mountain forest specialty with delicious meat and rich in nutrients. So at first I thought the output would be favorable, but after a period of doing business, the story of dui consumption became a difficult problem. Because my cooperative alone does not have enough quantity for a shipment. But since joining forces with Tra My Dui Cooperative, I have regularly exported 50 - 70 dui each week. My business has become more favorable and prosperous because of that.”
Similarly, through the social network Facebook, Ms. Nguyen Thi Hanh (village 2, Tra Giang commune, Bac Tra My) also connected to do business. “My business scale is still quite small, so the competitiveness in the market is very low due to transportation costs, depending on combining orders with others... However, when participating in the bamboo rat farming chain with Tra My bamboo rat cooperative, I feel secure in developing this farming model. Currently, I export 15 bamboo rats per week, but will expand the scale in the near future" - Ms. Hanh said.
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