Phu Lien flower and ornamental plant craft village, Hong Phong commune, Nam Sach district, Hai Duong province has nearly 400 households working in the profession, cultivating an area of about 22 hectares, of which 70% of the area is used for growing peach blossoms. These days, flower-growing households in Phu Lien village are busy preparing to bring flowers to the Lunar New Year market, with some happy and others worried.
With less than 20 days left until Lunar New Year, Mr. Dang Van Hung's family (Phu Lien village, Hong Phong commune) is urgently stripping leaves and pruning branches for 1,000 peach trees to enter the care stage to help the trees bloom on time, serving the Tet market.
According to Mr. Hung, Typhoon Yagi damaged 30% of his family's peach garden, with estimated damage of up to 300 million VND. Fortunately, the family was able to restore the peach garden after the storm. Currently, the weather is very favorable, if it continues like this, the peach blossoms will bloom in time for Tet, and they can still make a profit.
“Due to the impact of natural disasters, the number of peach trees this year is not abundant, so the price will increase from a few hundred to a few million VND. For small ornamental peach trees, the price will range from 200,000 to 300,000 VND/tree. Meanwhile, large, beautiful trees will cost three times more, ranging from 10 to 12 million VND/tree,” said Mr. Hung.
To prepare for Tet, Ms. Nguyen Thi Thuan (Phu Lien village, Hong Phong commune) has planted more than 4,000 varieties of short-term flowers such as Chrysanthemums and Gerberas. However, in contrast to Mr. Dang Van Hung's family, there are still nearly 20 days left until Tet, but all the flowers in Ms. Thuan's garden have bloomed before the expected time.
According to Ms. Thuan, this year’s weather is less cold, hot and cold erratically, making it difficult to take care of short-term flowers. This is also the common situation of families growing short-term flowers in the Phu Lien flower and ornamental plant craft village.
“Because the flowers for Tet have all bloomed, they can only be sold on the 15th of December to recover capital. The flowers reserved for the first month of the year will have to be sold during Tet. So after the first month of the year, the family does not know what to sell. Last year, the price of flowers ranged from 5,000 to 6,000 VND/flower at the peak, but this year it is probably only 3,000 to 4,000 VND/flower because they bloomed too early and the quality is not good,” Ms. Thuan shared.
Speaking with Lao Dong on January 10, Mr. Vuong Van Giang - Chairman of the People's Committee of Hong Phong commune - said: The ornamental flowers and plants in Phu Lien craft village help the income of the people here to be relatively stable, especially for peach growing households with an income of over 100 million VND/1 sao of cultivated land.
The revenue from the flower and ornamental plant growing industry of Phu Lien villagers in 2023 is over 28 billion VND. However, due to the impact of storm No. 3, the productivity and quality of people's flowers decreased, the total revenue in 2024 is estimated to reach only over 15 billion VND.
According to Mr. Giang, in order to develop the flower and ornamental plant growing profession in Phu Lien village more effectively, the People's Committee of Hong Phong commune has requested the People's Committee of Nam Sach district to pay attention to guiding and supporting the locality in building an OCOP product brand for peach blossoms to enhance the brand value of Phu Lien peach trees.
