Cashew farmers switch to rubber
Cashew farmers switch to rubber
Many farmers in the southeastern province of Binh Phuoc, the country's largest cashew cultivation area, have switched to growing rubber trees as the price of cashews has fallen by 50 per cent.
Farmer Ma Van Quang of Dong Phuoc District's Thuan Loi Commune, said he did not have enough money to continue to cultivate cashews this year, especially after a poor harvest.
The price of cashew nuts has dropped to VND26,000-27,000 (around US$1.28) a kg compared to VND37,000-40,000 ($1.76-1.9) a kg last year.
"My neigbours have also cut down their cashew orchards," Quang said.
Tran Ngoc Tuan, whose orchard is near Quang's, cut down four ha of his six-ha cashew orchard.
"The income from cashews is now even lower than that from cassava," said Tuan, who had grown the trees for more than 10 years.
Farmers with orchards that have productive trees are also switching to other crops.
Nguyen Thi Quynh Giao, a trader who buys cashew-tree wood in Bu Gia Map District, said she had never seen so much cutting of wood.
"If this cutting continues, this area will have no cashew orchards in the next few years," she said.
Traders buy cashew wood for VND15-20 million ($714-952) a ha, and then they sell it for firewood.
Tran Ngoc Kinh, head of the province's Sub-department of Plant Protection, blamed the situation on the lack of close cooperation among farmers and cashew processors.
"Binh Phuoc has the country's largest cashew cultivation area, but there is no processor cooperating with farmers to develop cashew cutivation areas," he said.
Processors typically wait until the harvest season to buy cashew nuts, he said, adding that many processors do not buy domestic nuts for production but import them from Africa.
Recently, the province's Department of Agriculture and Rural Development encouraged farmers to grow cacao trees in their cashew orchards, which is expected to bring higher incomes to farmers.
The area under cashew cultivation in Binh Phuoc fell from 180,000 ha in 2005 to 167,000 ha in 2009, and to 148,000 last year, according to the Binh Phuoc Province Cashew Association
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