The price of pineapple has dropped sharply, farmers are worried about heavy losses

In the early days of June, in the pineapple growing capital of Thanh Hoa in Ha Long commune and Quang Trung ward, farmers are hiring people to work hard to harvest amid the intense heat. On the hillsides, ripe yellow pineapples cover the fields, but there are no longer bustling traders like every year.

Plunging prices and slow purchasing power make many people nervous when the results after more than a year of care are at risk of loss.

At the pineapple field in Khac Dung village, Ha Long commune, Mr. Quach Van Phan continuously checked the pineapple beds that were ready to be harvested. His family invested about 400 million VND for more than 2 hectares of pineapple, but so far they have only sold about three sao (equivalent to 1,500 m2), earning nearly 50 million VND.

The remaining area is still in the field while many fruits begin to have brown skin and damage due to prolonged heat. “Sometimes a kilogram of pineapple is not equal to a bunch of vegetables at the market,” Mr. Phan said.

According to him, last year beautiful pineapples were sold for 14,000 VND per kg, with the average price of all types being about 9,000 VND per kg. But this year, 1 kg of first-grade pineapple is only 6,000-7,000 VND, and there are almost no buyers for small or melasma fruits. The sharp drop in price and the amount of damaged pineapples put Mr. Phan’s family at risk of losing hundreds of millions of dong.

Not far from Mr. Phan’s pineapple field, Ms. Tran Thi Hong also helplessly watched thousands of pineapples gradually ripen and spoil in the field. Her family grows about 2 hectares of pineapple, but nearly half of the area is affected due to slow consumption. “Pineapple cannot be sold. Due to prolonged hot weather, it browns and rots right in the field,” Ms. Hong said.

According to her, the damage does not only lie in lost fruit output. Many affected pineapple trees cannot use the tops to make seedlings for the next crop, increasing input production costs.

The entire commune currently has about 700 hectares of pineapples. According to Ms. Phung Thi Luyen, an expert at Ha Long Commune’s Economic Department, the sharp drop in prices and adverse weather caused many production households to fall into loss.

Many households have to use sunshade nets to limit fruit burning, but the results are not significant. Along inter-village roads, many piles of pineapples are discarded or thrown away because there are no buyers.

Mr. Quach Van Nhat, Head of Khac Dung village, said that in no other year has pineapple consumption been so difficult. The number of traders coming to purchase has decreased sharply, causing many pineapple areas to be overripe and lose their commercial value. “Pineapple is about to be harvested but there are no buyers, people are very impatient,” Mr. Nhat said.

The main reason for the sharp decline in pineapple prices is that the planted area is rapidly increasing while the output still depends mainly on free traders.tAccording to Mr. Trinh Van Chat, Head of Cultivation Department, Thanh Hoa Plant Protection and Cultivation Department. Consumption chains and product consumption contracts with businesses are still limited, making the market susceptible to oversupply when output increases sharply.

Thanh Hoa’s agricultural industry said that the expansion of pineapple area in recent years stemmed from a period of high pineapple prices, sometimes reaching 15,000-16,000 VND per kg. Many households have converted sugarcane land to pineapple cultivation, along with the application of better intensive farming techniques, helping productivity increase significantly.

According to previous planning, by 2030, Thanh Hoa is expected to develop about 2,300 hectares of pineapples. However, after this plan was no longer valid, the pineapple area in the area increased to about 5,500 hectares, more than twice the original orientation.

Mr. Chat analyzed that the current investment cost for one hectare of pineapple is about 275 million VND, including seeds, fertilizer, labor and land costs. At a price of about 5,000 VND per kilogram, new growers can break even. If prices continue to fall or output is affected by weather, the risk of loss is huge.

To solve the output problem, Thanh Hoa province has just attracted two large investors to promote the construction of a large-scale pineapple processing factory. When put into operation, these factories are expected to need raw materials equivalent to 2,500 hectares of pineapple, contributing to consuming output for the current raw material area of ​​more than 5,000 hectares.

According to Mr. Chat, localities are also implementing policies to support land accumulation and develop concentrated production areas, and at the same time require localities to strictly control the expansion of new planting areas, guide people to produce multiple crops, manage seed sources and support the development of tissue culture seedlings to improve productivity, quality and economic efficiency.