Farm development towards tourism

A corner of the ecological farm welcoming visitors in Hoang Son commune (Nong Cong).

Located right on National Highway 217B, the pink-fleshed grapefruit farm of Mrs. Bui Thi Kim Dung in Quang Binh Street, Ha Long Town (Ha Trung) is green all year round. The entire 2,000 fruit trees are grown by the family with only one variety, the pink-fleshed Tan Lac Hoa Binh grapefruit. The 8 hectares of crops are divided into 2 production areas, planted in rows, with trees evenly spaced between trees, and cultivated in an organic manner, creating a peaceful, green space all year round. The grapefruit trees originating from Hoa Binh province have spread their branches and spread, and the owner has applied modern farming methods. Right from the first days of spring, the grapefruit forest blooms white in an area, spreading a fragrant aroma, attracting many people to visit and take pictures. In the following months until the Lunar New Year every year, the grapefruit crops gradually grow and turn pink and red, extremely beautiful.

After 10 years of taking root in Ha Trung, the newly planted trees have grown taller and more and more fruitful. Only when visiting directly in the last months of the year can one believe that there are grapefruit trees with up to 300 fruits, even 350 fruits, each tree must have a support and hanging system to prevent branches from breaking. Not only receiving groups of guests and farm owners who come to learn and gain experience, in recent years, Mrs. Dung's family has also organized to welcome guests to experience. Combined with a cafe, her family built a stilt house, built many miniature landscapes, turning the grapefruit farm into an attractive miniature ecological area. Dozens of kindergartens in Ha Trung district and Bim Son town have brought children to experience visiting the garden and picking grapefruit.

According to Ms. Bui Thi Kim Dung, the farm's profit has reached more than 1 billion VND/year, so the family has not paid much attention to the income from sightseeing and welcoming guests. For many kindergartens, it is almost free for the children. The reporter once witnessed a tour group from a kindergarten in Bim Son town coming here, the garden owner also peeled dozens of grapefruits into many trays for the children to experience for free, giving each child a fruit to take home to create a joyful atmosphere for the children. There is not much income from this activity, but for a farm, having many people come to visit has opened up a new direction, not simply production.

Hoang Son is a purely agricultural commune of Nong Cong district, but there are still many low-lying fields that are often flooded during the rainy season. Since then, many farmers are no longer interested in their fields, and many fields are still left fallow for one crop. Since 2019, Mr. Le Huy Hoang has contracted 5 hectares in Chia Mu field, which is often used for uncertain rice cultivation, to develop the farm. Initially, he also rented leveling machines, built temporary houses, dug ponds, and built livestock barns. "By 2021, seeing that the development of farmstay tourism models across the country brings high economic efficiency, I realized that this is a new trend in agricultural development, which can also develop tourism activities, so I decided to change direction. I have proactively sought out many ecological agricultural models in Hanoi, Hoa Binh, and key areas such as Moc Chau (Son La), Sa Pa (Lao Cai) to learn from their experiences and implement them," Mr. Hoang shared.

With thousands of coconut trees, many types of fruit trees such as lemon, guava, star apple, jackfruit... are planted to cover the entire production area. Up to now, many trees have been harvested, both developing production and creating shade, landscape and being an ideal environment for sightseeing and experience. The location of the farm development is only 16km from Thanh Hoa city, 10km from the center of Nong Cong district, he believes that he can develop the farm combined with experiential tourism . Then he invested in renovating the landscape, redesigning the campus, flower garden, multiplying lotus ponds, building many beautiful natural miniatures. Instead of barbed wire or rough walls like other farms, the entire fence around the farm here is planted with bougainvillea, hibiscus. Along the paths in the farm are shaded by rows of Northwest ban flowers, pink trumpet flowers and many other flowers blooming all year round.

In recent years, the farm has become a destination for groups of tourists from schools in and outside the district to go on picnics, families bringing their children to visit and experience the weekend, young people coming to take photos... In the future, he also hopes to apply for a license to build wooden houses, develop resort activities associated with food services, campfires and tourism services.

According to the Provincial Gardening and Farming Association, Thanh Hoa is developing dozens of farms that can be combined with welcoming guests. The most powerful developments include the grape farm in Dong Loi commune (Trieu Son) of Mr. Hoang Thanh Minh; the eco-tourism farm model of Mr. Pham Quang Vong, Dinh Tan commune (Yen Dinh)... This is a new direction of agricultural development, but there are still some mechanisms for model owners to make a breakthrough. Modern agriculture needs to aim for multi-value, so linking production with the development of sightseeing and experience services, creating output for products is also a direction full of potential.

Article and photos: Linh Truong

Source: https://baothanhhoa.vn/phat-trien-trang-trai-theo-huong-du-lich-253234.htm