Rice and pasta are both precarious

The field of Long Thanh hamlet in Long Khanh commune (Ben Cau district, Tay Ninh) is almost 100 hectares. Rice used to be grown here with a noodle crop (cassava). However, these crops are often endangered due to the irregular rainy season.

Mr. Pham Hong Loi, who lived in Long An Hamlet of Long Thuan Township (Ben Cau District), recalled the time when he only specialized in rice cultivation and said that life used to be precarious because one only relied on wet rice. Here, too, the monoculture of wet rice cultivation brings many disadvantages for the farmers, the profitability is not high.

“All kinds of natural disasters and epidemics in rice cultivation have completely disappeared. Then there’s the money for fertilizers, pesticides, equipment rental…minus the profit. Then the rice was bought from the merchants and pressed. “In general, it didn’t work or lost,” Mr. Loi gloomily recalls.

Similar to the cassava plant, Ms. Ngo Thi Thu An in Long Thuan Township is also fed up as she has been suffering from cassava mosaic disease for many years, which leads to poor productivity and lower economic efficiency. When it comes to growing cassava, Ms. An can only click her tongue and shake her head.

In recent crops, the inefficient rice and cassava growing areas have been switched to biomass maize (maize biomass) in some communities in Ben Cau district. Biomass corn takes less than three months to harvest, allowing farmers to avoid flooding during the rainy season. Corn can also be grown on many low fields, two crops of corn per year can be grown on high fields. As a result, farmers’ incomes were much higher than before for rice and wheat.

Due to the long-term cultivation of biomass maize in the field of the hamlet of Long Thinh (Long Khanh municipality), there is always a hustle and bustle of people buying maize during the harvest season. Corn fields have replaced inefficient rice in winter-spring and summer-autumn cultivation.

In recent years, the area planted with biomass corn has been rapidly increased in Ben Cau district, breaking the inefficient monoculture of rice. Biomass corn is easy to grow, has high yields, and is under contract, so people feel safe to expand the area.

In the past, rice was grown almost exclusively in this area, followed by wheat, sugar cane and corn seedlings. In recent years, along with the increase in the number of cattle, large fields have emerged in Ben Cau specializing in the cultivation of biomass corn as fodder for cows.

According to Mr. Pham Thai Huan, head of Ben Cau District Agricultural Extension Station, in 2014-2015, biomass corn was mainly cultivated in the winter-spring harvest. Due to the stable profits at a high level and the increasing demand from off-take partners, many farmers have recently signed contracts to grow biomass corn in the summer-autumn crop with increasing area.

“The areas where biomass corn acreage is increasing rapidly are Long Chu, Tien Thuan and Long Khanh communes (Ben Cau district). In the past, the fields in Long Chu township were specialized in growing rice with only two to three harvests per year. In the meantime, more than 200 hectares have been converted to specializing in biomass maize. Product consumption contracts have been signed for all of these raw material areas,” Mr. Huan said.

Mr. Truong Van Mong’s family has been resident in Long Chu country for many generations and has specialized exclusively in agriculture. After growing rice for decades, his family also switched to growing sugar cane and cassava on the same land.

When the prices of traditional crops fell for a long time, Mr. Mong kept searching for other crop varieties, including corn seedlings and the current biomass corn. In particular, the biomass corn cultivation is harvested in just 3 months, the rest of the year one or two more crops can be grown.

“Each crop of biomass corn only takes about 85-90 days to grow. I can do a few harvests a year. At the end of the harvest, the cows come to the field to harvest, weigh and buy it on site for VND 1,500.” “/kg. On average, the biomass corn amount for each crop is about 45-60 tons/ha, the profit is about 30-40 million VND/ha,” Mong shared.

According to the Tay Ninh Agricultural Extension Center, biomass corn is a beneficial crop in Ben Cau district due to its suitable soil, large arable land and less waterlogging.

“The Ben Cau District area is very close to dairy farms, which helps reduce transportation costs, so biomass corn crops grown on rice land have high profits, which is well received by farmers around the dairy farm area. We are also working with seed companies and crop protection companies to soon help farmers obtain good corn varieties that are less pest and disease tolerant, have good growth and are suitable for use as livestock feed to incorporate into the structure. manufacturing. “The area planted with biomass corn is expected to increase rapidly in the near future,” said Ha Thanh Tung, director of Tay Ninh Agricultural Extension Center.

Sustainable orientation in the new livestock capital

Tay Ninh is considered the new livestock capital of the south. The livestock bigwigs of Vietnam and around the world flock to Tay Ninh to invest and set up large farms.

Recently, the People’s Committee of Tay Ninh Province successfully organized the “Enterprise Networking Forum to Invest and Develop High-Tech Agricultural Ecosystem in Tay Ninh Province in 2023”. Accordingly, more than VND 4,600 billion will be invested in the development of high-tech agricultural ecosystem in Tay Ninh. This is also driving demand for animal feed, with biomass corn being a typical crop.

Mr. Trinh Quoc Dung, Managing Director of Vinamilk’s Material Area Development, said: The Vinamilk Dairy Farm (Ben Cau District) is currently preparing to expand its size and use modern technology to raise an additional 8,000 cows. Cow. Covering an area of ​​685 ha, the total dairy herd of Vinamilk Dairy Farm is expected to reach 16,000 heads, accounting for more than 62% of the province’s total cow herd.

“Therefore, there is a great need for corn feed on the Vinamilk dairy farm. In order to take the initiative for food sources in addition to self-production, we also signed a contract for the regular purchase of agricultural products from more than 1,000 households in the province, including about 50,000 tons of biomass corn and 4,000 tons of straw per year processing of feed for cows” , informed Mr. Trinh Quoc Dung.

The Tay Ninh Agricultural Extension Center said that after harvesting, the whole plant, leaves and corn are placed in a shredding system for livestock to eat directly or further process into animal feed, such as through composting. Sour, long-term use. However, in order to consume products, farmers and cooperatives producing corn biomass must meet quality requirements, especially for safe production, and ensure the conditions of raw materials for animal feed. dairy cow.

“Feed for dairy cows must have a clear origin and comply with legal standards. Therefore, from soil selection to weed treatment, seed selection to pesticide use, corn pest and disease prevention, etc., farmers must use agricultural materials under the guidance of company officials. This is also beneficial for farmers as they don’t have to spend money to invest in pesticides and crop protection products, but still have the product to consume,” said Mr. Ha Thanh Tung, director of Tay Ninh Agricultural Extension Center. fox.

Mr. Nguyen Dinh Xuan, director of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development in Tay Ninh, said the efficiency of the biomass corn cultivation model has been confirmed. Therefore, in the coming period, through the Provincial Agricultural Extension Center and agricultural extension stations, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development will mobilize farmers to increase their acreage to increase their income.

“Because of the land advantage and historically demonstrated economic efficiency, biomass corn will soon become a beneficial crop in terms of the province’s agricultural sector strategy. We will also look for more product buyers and connect them so that people who grow biomass corn can safely produce and increase their income,” said Mr. Nguyen Dinh Xuan.