Like so many other young people, Mr Nguyen Huu Hoang, a native of Truong Dinh hometown, Hoa Lien Commune, left his countryside to go to pursue better career prospects in urban areas. However, he had always borne in mind his desire to return to his homeland to turn the barren hills into forests since he see that the planting of large trees will bring great benefits to the people in the long run. Not only does it serves the purpose of improving forest cover but also creates environmental landscapes.

Mr Nguyen Huu Hoang has invested effort and money in planting large timber trees in Hoa Lien Commune, Hoa Vang District. Photo: TRONG HUNG

Mr Hoang used to be a forest product trader,  so he found that the quality of indigenous wood in Viet Nam has been better than that of other countries.

However, the exploitation has taken place massively in recent years, so forest resources have been increasingly depleted, leading to many disasters such as landslides and floods which make people's lives increasingly difficult. Therefore, Mr Hoang soon realized that he was also partly to blame for making the forest in his hometown poor quickly.

In early 2018, Mr Hoang decided to return to his hometown to plant trees and create forests. For many people, it is hard to understand his choice because it is easier to make a profit if he grows small trees which creates profits quickly. Moreover, his afforestation project has large investment capital, and he has to wait 20 to 30 years to harvest large timber.

However, thanks to the support and consent from his wife and children, he went to Thanh Hoa province to buy seeds from the Forest Seed Joint Stock Company to transport to the Hoa Lien Commune.

For the time being, Mr Hoang has planted 55% of the registered land area with 55,000 Chitta gong wood plants, 60,000 Burma padauk trees, 60,000 red Dalbergia tonkinensis trees, 3,000 sandalwood trees, and a load of other timber trees. The forest has now created a stable income for 15 workers. It is predicted that the forest will have a commercial value of 300-500 billion VND after 20 years.

However, the special value that the forest of Mr Hoang brings to nature is to create ecological balance, increase green coverage, and protect water sources.

According to Mr Le Dinh Ca, Head of the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development of Hoa Vang District, the large timber plantation project in sub-zone 22, Hoa Lien Commune is the first large tree planting model in Da Nang to create stable and long-term indigenous large timber forests which are suitable to the local climate and soil, contributing to the improvement of the living environment.

Currently, the agricultural sector is studying and proposing the municipal authorities to have a mechanism to support people and replicate this model in many areas in the province.

As shared by the Vice Chairman of the Da Nang People's Committee Tran Phuoc Son, afforestation is one of the key tasks of the agriculture industry for the period 2019 to 2030. Accordingly, the city also has policies to support people and businesses to plant forests.

However, currently, the implementation of these guidelines and policies has been still slow due to the limited access of people, organizations and businesses.

Therefore, localities need to continue to strengthen the dissemination of policies to support the afforestation of large timber materials so that organizations and households can grasp the policy and participate in creating a large source of wood materials for the city, contributing to the maintenance of forest cover.

“The planting of large timber trees not only brings high economic value but also limits a huge number of landslides and forest fires. At the same time, it is necessary to encourage and create conditions for people, organizations and businesses to make long-term investments in planting large timber trees for sustainable forest development," said Mr Tran Phuoc Son.

Reporting by TRONG HUNG- Translating by T.VY