• Bright spot of coastal education
  • Longan season on coastal Giong land
  • Efforts to revive coastal protection forests and adapt to climate change

A place to "gather" poor households

Previously, poor households, households in difficult circumstances, Khmer ethnic households living along Vinh Thinh coast had no stable jobs, no land for production, temporary houses, and their lives depended on catching crabs and snails on the alluvial plains , which was very precarious and miserable. In 2006, Dong Tien Cooperative was established with 22 members, creating livelihoods for many people. To date, the number of members has reached 552 people. Each cooperative member contributes from 5 to 200 million VND to develop production together. The cooperative's charter capital is more than 5.8 billion VND.

In the early days of Dong Tien Cooperative, Mr. Huynh Mung Em (Chairman of the Board of Directors and Director of Dong Tien Cooperative) and some members of the Cooperative traveled to Ben Tre province to learn from experience. After that, the Cooperative mobilized a business to support the purchase of clam seeds for farming. Thanks to perseverance and determination, after more than 1 year, the Cooperative earned a net profit of more than 4 billion VND. The initial success became a major turning point, building the Cooperative's trust with its members. Assigned 900 hectares of coastal alluvial land for clam farming, the Cooperative annually harvests about 500-600 tons of clam seeds and 15-2 thousand tons of clam meat, earning billions of VND in profit.

Mr. Huynh Mung Em checks the harvested clams.

Change life from clams

Thanks to effective production activities, Dong Tien Cooperative has contributed to changing the lives of hundreds of households living along the coast. If previously 90% of its members were poor households, now only 0.5% are. From poor households, without land for production, making a living day by day by catching seafood on the alluvial plains, they now have stable incomes, spacious houses, and some households have even become members with large shares in the Cooperative. A typical example is Mr. Son Duong's household (Vinh Lac hamlet, Vinh Hau commune) - a poor Khmer household, after 8 years of participating in Dong Tien Cooperative, has had a comfortable life.

Not only sharing profits with capital contributors, Dong Tien Cooperative also creates jobs for hundreds of local workers through the work of protecting clam beds, harvesting, transporting clams... During clam harvest seasons, the Cooperative creates jobs for 250-400 workers each day. Each worker earns from 250-350 thousand VND/shift.

Dong Tien Cooperative harvests clams.

To continue to develop and increase income, Dong Tien Cooperative is now expanding into the field of eco-tourism with services such as: taking tourists to visit and experience catching clams; serving on-site cuisine ... In addition, the Cooperative also builds clams into an OCOP product. In addition to self-mobilization, Mr. Huynh Mung Em also recommended that the province should have a priority policy to support loan capital so that Dong Tien Cooperative has a strong enough capital source and is proactive in production.

Dong Tien Cooperative is not only a typical model of effective collective economic development but also demonstrates the will and aspiration of the poor coastal people to rise up. This is truly a “warm home” for hundreds of households with the dream of changing their lives from clams.

Minh Dat

Source: https://baocamau.vn/-mai-am-cua-nhung-ho-ngheo-song-ven-bien-a121129.html