Provinces in the Hong River Delta are providing the market of Hanoi and its environs a large amount of farm produce including fruits and vegetables of different kinds.

Biological pesticide efficiency is humble so this kind of pesticide is not able to stamp out an epidemic as promptly as farmers want. It takes one time to learn how to use biological pesticides, while biological pesticides are more expensive than normal pesticides and farmers haven’t fully aware of the importance of biological pesticides in safe product production. These explain why biological pesticide use is still limited.

Dr. Nguyen Hong Son and his colleagues from the Agricultural Environment Institute and the Vietnam Agricultural Science Institute kicked off a project entitled ’Production of safe vegetables with biotechnology’. The VND3-billion project analyzes good and weak points and application scale of individual biological products while constructing industrial processes to produce safe vegetables.

Dr. Son said that there are new-generation biological pesticides that are highly efficient, effective for a long time and stable in efficiency and quality. Project researchers have found good biological pesticides like the Matrine, the Azadirachin and the Abamectin.

Using the right pesticide properly is important to reach high product yield and quality. For example, water morning glory should be sprayed with pesticide seven times per crop (from March to October), while pumpkin buds should be sprayed with pesticide only three times per crop.

For tomato, cucumber, chayote and Chinese pea that have a short circle of harvest and a high pressure for pest control, it is difficult to forecast time of massive pest appearance so it is hard to control pests on these crops, Dr. Son said. This is why these plants should be sprayed with pesticides many times per crop. For example, Chinese pea should be sprayed with pesticide six times per crop, while tomato and cucumber should be sprayed with pesticides five times per crop.

A problem is that biological pesticides are not strong enough to destroy coleopterons and insects that can move quickly. Therefore, biological and normal pesticides are used alternatively for best pest control efficiency. Experts advise farmers to prepare soil before cultivation, make ditches inundated with water before spraying pesticide to prevent matured pests from moving and to destroy them.

The project for biotechnology application in safe vegetable production development has formed safe vegetable growing areas in Hanoi (the capital) and Hai Duong and Vinh Phuc provinces. Thirty-one varieties of vegetables are being grown in these areas, which have a total area of 70.5 hectares. The project has 85 product delivery points and nine international offices with 585 customers. It has provided the market with more than 1,741 tonnes of product.

This project’s experience shows that combination of proper use of biological pesticides with consistent application of support techniques is important for efficient pest control and farm produce safety and quality assurance. Safe vegetables have attracted buyers and are expected to attract more buyers in the future so safe vegetable production appears something good to do for farmers in the Red River Delta.

The project is still researching to find out new safe farm produce production models suitable to Vietnamese conditions.

Farmer households should work with each other to construct and develop a trademark for their products and have their products assessed and certified by independent consulting organizations. It is important to improve consumer’s awareness of the importance of safe product use so prices for safe farm produce can increase.

VietNamNet/VEN