Dubbed “black gold”, pepper has helped thousands of households change their lives, becoming a billionaire. But now, pepper pushes them to difficulty, debt piling up.
The pepper garden of Mrs. Ho Thi Hang's family, more and more died in Tan Phong hamlet, Tan Thanh commune, Bu Dop commune. Image: Hong Thuy.
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The pepper gardens die
Coming to Bu Dop, one of the pepper capitals of Binh Phuoc province in the last days of February – the time of harvesting pepper, no more crowded atmosphere as the time when the pepper price reached more than VND 200,000 / kg. The pepper gardens were empty, from the lush gardens to the golden gardens because of illness.
Just scratching the batches of freshly picked and dried pepper to meet the debt repayment, unable to hide the sadness on the austere face, Mr. Do Xuan The in Bu Tam hamlet, Hung Phuoc commune, Bu Dop district said, 10 years ago, When pepper was priced, people rushed to plant it, their families were impatient, so they decided to destroy 2ha of rubber to grow pepper. But before harvesting, pepper prices began to plummet. From more than 2,000 pillars, now only about half, because of devaluation, do not dare to invest money, leading to water shortages and epidemics.
Looking at the wilting and ruined pepper garden, The Thau was gloomy: This year continues to fail, not only my family, but also this hamlet, most of which are in trouble.
House that has rubber, it still supports, but only very difficult to spend. Now we want to invest, restore pepper gardens or switch crops, intercropping, but the difficult bundle of wisdom, which is not available, also difficult to borrow.
Unfortunately, there is also pepper to be sold as Mr. The's household, Mrs. Ho Thi Hang's family in Tan Phong hamlet, Tan Thanh commune find some pepper chains to store fish.
Taking us to visit the “target graveyard” of our family, removing every branch of dried pepper Ms. Hang sadly said: “My family has more than 1,000 pillars, died a lot, only a few hundred but also very poor. Ten years ago, when I came here, I had just set up an investment capital, I didn't get much money, so I dropped the price, then I died. Each time pouring more than ten million drugs, not counting the rolling staff.
Currently the garden is almost dead, the family is planning to renovate other land. The cost of recruiting workers is also 200,000 VND per person per day, sometimes even more. So if the price of pepper is reached, after the remuneration is only a little surplus, the loss must compensate for additional losses, so many households will not pick. ”
Bank debt is difficult to repay
Most local people said that to invest in pepper, most of the people here have mortgaged their assets to borrow money from banks, a few tens of millions of households, many households up to billions of dong. Because pepper was both dead and devalued, people were in difficulties.
Besides those who still cling to pepper, waiting for the price to prosper, many families have decided to cut down and plant other plants. Accept lost investment money.
Picking up the mixed, ripe green pepper chains to break down, shifting to short-term tree planting, Bui Thi Binh in Tan Binh hamlet, Tan Tien commune said that the family had more than 1,500 green pepper posts, but had to demolish. even very sad.
In order to earn this amount, the family had to mortgage assets and borrow more than VND 200 million from the bank, if they left even though the yield was sufficient, they could only pay the wages, while the bank interest had to be paid monthly, quarterly .
“The sawing tree lost part of its body, so sad. To make pepper to harvest day must invest a lot. Now people without cash must borrow money from banks to invest. Counting the holes too, had to give up. Currently the family is considering converting rubber. In the immediate future, pruning corn and raising goats will help pay interest on the bank, ”said Binh sadly.
Many households cut pepper gardens and planted other trees. Image: Trần Trung.
According to Vong Cam Sang, a pepper farmer in Tan Phong hamlet, “the biggest desire of the people is the bank for the extension and the debt to maintain the investment capital. We hope to spend money on people to have money to repay the debt, but now we only have it delivered to the bank, but where do we get the money to pay? ”.
According to statistics of Binh Phuoc Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, in 2019, the total pepper area of the province is 16,855 ha, down 132ha over the same period.
In which, there are over 892ha infected with nematode, 339ha infected with slow death, mainly concentrated in Bu Dop and Loc Ninh districts.
Talking about the status of pepper plants and developing solutions for local agriculture, Dr. Nguyen Van Bac, Acting Director of Bu Dop District Agricultural Service Center, said that the area of pepper in Bu Dop district in 3 years over plummeted. The main reason is due to falling prices, so people neglected in the care process leading to weakened gardens leading to diseases.
Pepper growing areas are very difficult, if waiting for income from pepper plants to return to investment, it is certainly not enough, so those who want to keep pepper are required to have another income.
In fact, most farmers in Bu Dop pepper have to borrow from banks, so now paying interest to banks is also a difficult problem for people.
The center has also made every effort to guide people to plant a number of short-term crops, raise cattle and poultry on the remaining land area to get short-term farming, to cover difficulties ahead.
At the same time, it is recommended that the banking industry should take timely supporting measures such as continuing short-term loans to take care of and medium and long-term loans for intercropping investment for customers who still have gardens.
The long-term solution is to re-plan production areas, then step up the application of science and technology, standardize the cultivation process, and link pepper production towards clean agriculture. This is an indispensable direction for sustainable pepper development.
“The policy of Binh Phuoc province and the district is not to develop more pepper trees, at the same time advising people not to” cut one tree to plant another, “but consider keeping the current crop if the tree is not sick, dead. As for conversion, we must find crops suitable to the climate and soil of the locality. Or do not convert the whole hill but partially, or intercropped, ”PhD Nguyen Van Bac.
