The durian billionaire in the remote area

Instead of chasing market trends, focus on cultivating your crops to achieve the highest possible yield and quality. This is the experience of a farmer applying it to his family's land. This experience has helped him become a billionaire and a renowned, successful farmer in the remote Rô Men region.

Mr. Nguyen Duc Ha

• INTERCROPPING FOR BILLIONS OF DOLLARS

Mr. Nguyen Duc Ha, a farmer from Hamlet 4, Ro Men Commune, Dam Rong District, is in the midst of preparing to harvest his durian crop. At the same time, he is also carefully tending to his thousands of coffee plants that are bearing fruit. With 8 hectares of cultivated land on sloping hills, Mr. Nguyen Duc Ha specializes in coffee cultivation. For the past five years, he has intercropped 400 durian trees of the Thai Mon Thont variety. This is the second year the durian trees have yielded a harvest.

Mr. Nguyen Duc Ha shared: “Growing durian on sloping land has many benefits such as well-drained, dry soil, ensuring a healthy root system and fewer diseases. However, farmers must have more careful planting and care techniques, and water and fertilizer must be applied according to a good care regimen to ensure the trees do not lack water or nutrients.” In 2024, Mr. Ha harvested 30 tons of durian fruit. He also plans to harvest 30 tons in the 2025 durian season. According to him, when durian trees are still young, they shouldn't be over-harvested, allowing them to recover, develop strong roots and leaves, and be ready for subsequent harvests.

Mr. Ha also chose a farming method close to nature, allowing durian trees to pollinate according to their natural growth cycle and local weather conditions. According to him, allowing durian trees to pollinate naturally, without planned flowering and fruiting, will prolong the growing season. However, given the characteristics of the Ro Men region, naturally occurring durian trees will flower later, leading to a later harvest, avoiding the peak season, and resulting in more stable prices for farmers. At the same time, allowing natural pollination eliminates the cost of inducing simultaneous flowering, reducing investment pressure on the orchards. This is also why he can cultivate at a low cost on a large area. For the 2025 durian crop, Mr. Ha's trees will flower very late. While other orchards already have young fruit, his durian trees will not have bloomed by the end of April 2025.

• FARMERS SHOULD NOT CHASE THE MARKET

One experience that Mr. Nguyen Duc Ha highly values ​​and is willing to share with the community is that farmers should carefully plan their crops and not blindly follow market trends. “Previously, I planted only coffee on this plot of land. When I saw the price of durian rising, many farmers switched entirely to durian, but I chose to intercrop it in moderation, keeping the majority of the area dedicated to coffee. In my opinion, farmers should be level-headed and not blindly follow market trends by cutting down or replanting the same crops as everyone else. They should focus on caring for their existing crops to achieve high yields and quality, rather than cutting them down and replanting,” Mr. Nguyen Duc Ha shared.

Because of his loyalty to coffee cultivation, he has reaped sweet rewards. Each year, his family's coffee plantation yields 20 tons of green coffee beans. He said that because the coffee plantation is old, he chose to graft and renovate it with a dwarf green variety that produces large, high-yielding beans. “Whether I grow coffee or durian, I always aim for a model that is close to the natural habitat of the plants. For durian, I choose to let the trees flower naturally, pollinating and bearing fruit without using any pesticides. For coffee, I choose a method of planting with the shoots free, which significantly reduces labor but requires increased fertilizer to ensure the plants have enough strength to nourish the shoots and fruit. Planting trees according to their natural growth cycle has the advantage of making them healthier, less prone to disease, and requiring less care. However, it demands that farmers invest heavily in fertilizers, especially organic fertilizers, to ensure the plants receive sufficient nutrients,” shared successful farmer Nguyen Duc Ha.

“Mr. Nguyen Duc Ha is a skilled farmer in our area, and also an enthusiastic member of the farmers' movement, always ready to support his neighbors with technical assistance,” said Mr. Pang Tin Y Krang, Chairman of the Ro Men Commune Farmers' Association. Mr. Ha's orchard is also a place where farmers in the region can come to learn about durian and coffee cultivation techniques on sloping land, techniques for digging holes on the hilltop, and installing automatic irrigation systems to release water to the roots of the trees, reducing irrigation costs for farmers. It is known that Mr. Nguyen Duc Ha earns 3-4 billion VND annually, making him a model farmer in the remote Ro Men area. Mr. Nguyen Duc Ha's production experience also gives other farmers a new perspective on production investment, cost reduction, and not chasing market trends.

Source: https://baolamdong.vn/kinh-te/202506/ty-phu-sau-rieng-o-vung-sau-ee42c5f/