4.0 farmers of the West: 9X and his message - ‘Turn food into medicine’

Nguyen Vu Linh was born in My Thuan commune, Hon Dat district, Kien Giang province. Experiencing many hardships on the way back to his hometown to become a farmer, eventually his efforts have borne fruit as he now owns a 15 ha organic ecological farm called An Moc Farm.

Despite being a leader of dozens of employees, when we arrived Linh was soaking himself in a canal to pick up algae and moss to make organic fertilizer. "Does the ‘director’ still wade through the canal and play in the water like a little kid?” we gleefully asked. Linh responded with a smile, "Spare me brothers, what director? There is a lot of things to prepare, a mountain of work waits ahead, how can I sit still and play around? Besides, I love to be in the fields."

Hardships on the path of reaching his dream

During his days in elementary school Linh had always dreamt of being a farmer in his hometown. So when he finished elementary school he left behind his studies and ran away from home to Saigon to find a job, intending to earn some capital and then return to his hometown to build a farm. The first place he worked was at a supermarket supplying packaged food. Seeing a boy so young keeping his nose to the grindstone, the kind owner advised Linh to work and study in high school at the same time.

After finishing high school, Linh took the university entrance exam. He then passed the entrance exam of two schools, the University of Civil Engineering and the Electric Power College of Ho Chi Minh City. Still uninterested in studying, Linh signed up for military service.

In early 2015 Linh was discharged from the army and began his years as a real farmer. He went to Tra Vinh and applied for a job on a farm. He learned a lot at this place, from business strategy and market access to packaging and preservation processes. After sometime he resigned and went to Long An to apply for a job at a raw material farm, to accumulate experience and knowledge about microbiology.

Linh returned to his hometown of Kien Giang in 2017 and started shaping An Moc Farm from his family’s 3,000m² land. In order to have some initial capital, he sold handmade products such as hanging straps made from umbrella grass, reed straws, and coconut shell cups. He even managed to export 500 coconut shell cups and spoons to Singapore. After things had settled down he continued to invest and rent more land to expand An Moc Farm.

Hearing the story to this point, some may think that Linh’s career path did not face that much hardship, but Linh’s tone suddenly dimmed, continuing his story. ”The real tragedies began in 2019. My company had just been established when Storm No. 3 swept through this land. The big storms hit hard, right in the flood season as well. It was raining nonstop, so 10 ha of our farm’s raw material trees were drowned. I almost lost everything. The estimated damage was VND 3 billion. I had to borrow money from everywhere to strive for recovery, but only two-thirds of the farm could be saved."

A year later, when the business had recovered to a certain level, An Moc Farm had a pharmaceutical material export contract with India and South Korea. Everything seemed to be going well, but no one could expect the Covid-19 pandemic to come. The contract with India went out the window because of that.

The company struggled to survive by all means possible: looking for Thai partners, reaching out to other businesses, pharmaceutical facilities and hospitals. But consumption remained meagre, so they had to use cold storage. The damage from the two "storms" was too great, so many shareholders had to say goodbye to An Moc Farm.

"I thought I was at the end of the road, that giving up was the only choice left, but fortunately a "noblewoman" offered a helping hand. She was the director of a paint company. She called to say that she admired the willpower of An Moc Farm, and she could lend us money without interest. Thanks to that, we once again could continue to invest," Linh said.

An Moc Farm in Hon Dat now has an area of 15 ha, including 10 ha of Phu Yen ginseng (Abelmoschus sagittifolius Kurz), 1.5 ha of butterfly pea flowers, and the rest of roses, jasmine, lotus, noni, mint, stevia, drumstick tree and other fruits. Linh is planning to expand the area by another 15 ha in U Minh Thuong (Kien Giang) and Cu Lao Dung (Soc Trang).

“Turn food into medicine”

An Moc Farm already has partners to purchase their Phu Yen ginseng and butterfly pea flowers, but Linh and his associates have other unique products from plants, roots, flowers and leaves to offer.

“An Moc has many types of drinks, and some of them are unique: My Nhan tea, with butterfly pea flower and herbs such as stevia and mint as the main ingredients. Binh An ginseng tea is also quite special. It is a combination of eight herbs, with excellent effects such as strengthening body resistance, liver detoxification, body purification, acne and skin treatment, and anti-oxidisation. Next we have An Moc Beauty-care tea, which is mild and sweet, cooked from ginkgo, red apple, shiraz (Gum Tragacanth), peach resin, honey locust, stevia, ginseng flower and rose.”

It’s common knowledge that there are many external forces that adversely affect human health, such as pollution and climate change, but food safety seems to be the closest to daily life. One of the reasons why Linh decided to return as a farmer is because he has this desire to create "green value" from the land, to create a better, safer and healthier lifestyle for everyone through An Moc Farm’s products.

Therefore An Moc Farm’s message is to "turn food into medicine, not the other way around". Since its establishment An Moc Farm has developed environmentally friendly consumption habits through preserving, containing or packaging products using bamboo, cork, coconut leaves and banana leaves, or using environmentally friendly kraft paper (paper or paperboard produced from chemical pulp produced in the kraft process) packaging.

Despite his relatively young age (28 this June), Linh has the mind of a true expert.

In my hometown there is still a lot of cultivated land. A lot of it has been deserted because young people have gone to the city to work as hired laborers. I just hope that after the Covid-19 pandemic the countryside will feel less lonely, fields and gardens will not be abandoned, partly reducing the pressure on the cities.

I think it is possible to get rich in one’s hometown without going far. Going far away from home to get rich is understandable, but if you go to the city to work as a hired worker, why don't you think of a way to make a living in your hometown? Why must one embark on such a common journey?

But with all that said, I also think there needs to be support from the government. For example, if farmers are equipped with and accumulate more knowledge, they will surely know how to get rich in their own fields, not to mention creating leverage to help Vietnam’s agriculture develop.