South Central - Central Highlands won big in the summer-autumn crop

In the summer-autumn crop of 2023, the South Central Coast andCentral Highlands provinces sowed over 349,100 ha of rice. At this time, rice in many areas is entering the peak harvest period.

According to local assessments, this year's summer-autumn rice crop yield is expected to be higher than in previous years. In particular, the northern provinces of the South Central Coast are estimated to reach 55 - 61 quintals/ha, while the southern provinces of the South Central Coast are expected to reach 60 - 85 quintals/ha. In the Central Highlands, the rice yield is expected to reach 54.8 - 70 tons/ha and the average rice yield is 17 - 17.5 tons/ha.

To get this result, localities in the region have had a thorough preparation from the stage of developing a flexible sowing plan according to the actual circumstances of each locality and effective use of water resources. In particular, thanks to localities developing prevention plans right from the beginning of the season, harmful organisms are kept at a low level, helping rice achieve high yields and good selling prices.

However, according to the Central Plant Protection Center (Department of Plant Protection), in this year's summer-autumn crop, provinces in the South Central Coast and Central Highlands are severely affected by extreme weather on agricultural production, especially hot sunny weather lasting on a large scale with concentrated and prolonged heavy rain.

In addition, many emerging and local pests appeared on crops in the summer-autumn crop of 2023 such as: On rice, 2-dot stem borers have caused severe local damage in Binh Thuan. The reason is that Binh Thuan has a lot of rice and tea overlapping in the field, and the continuous impact of storms No. 2 and No. 3, causing prolonged heavy rain in a large area, and reduces the effectiveness of prevention. Bo Chinh ginseng is experiencing mass death due to prolonged hot weather and accompanied by thunderstorms causing heat shock; Blackhead worms cause local damage in abandoned coconut gardens that lack investment in care and harvesting...

From now until the end of the season, the Plant Protection Center in the Central region recommended that the Department of Crop Production and Plant Protection of the provinces in the region assign technical staff to focus on key areas and protect summer-autumn crop production well.

Specifically on rice plants, pay attention to leaf-neck + cotton-neck blast disease, and grain rot disease... Causing damage to rice during the seedling-flowering-blooming stage on sunny days, early mornings and evenings with heavy rain and thunderstorms.

On durian trees, stem cracking disease continues to increase and cause damage in adverse weather conditions and disproportionate NPK fertilization, using unrotted manure at the post-harvest care stage. On cassava, viral leaf mosaic disease continues to cause damage in cassava growing areas...

The Crop Production and Plant Protection Subdepartment of the provinces in the region needs to coordinate closely with the Central Plant Protection Center to direct and take timely measures.

A business shared that households cancelling rice purchasing contracts after receiving deposits has had a big impact, but there is no binding legal mechanism.

For traders who purchase rice directly from small-scale farmers, there will be no sustainability and easy-to-break contracts. Farmers should join cooperative groups and cooperatives to buy and sell together with larger areas and more sustainable connections. Besides, participating in cooperative groups and cooperatives will help farmers reduce input costs and stabilize output.

Mr. Pham Van Thieu, Chairman of Bac Lieu Provincial People's Committee said that recently, he received many complaints from rice-buying enterprises in the province about farmers "breaking the truss". They did not agree to sell rice according to the contract commitment because the price of rice increased. The contract cancellation rate is about 20%. This has significantly affected the completion of rice export contracts of many enterprises with partners.

This situation shows that it is necessary to build a closer chain of rice production links. Business needs to harmonize the interests of businesses and farmers.