VietNamNet Bridge – Chinese cockroaches have been farmed on a large scale in the northern province of Bac Ninh with the “assistance” of “Chinese experts.” Vietnamese management agencies have warned that the black beetles could be a danger to the environment.

Chinese encourage Vietnamese to farm cockroaches

The cockroach’s house of HH Company.

HH is a well-known cockroach farming company in Quang Phu commune of Luong Tai district in Bac Ninh province.

Nguyen, the director of the company, said he studied under Nguyen Thi L, who returned from China and told him that the cockroach farming in China can bring a very high income.

Nguyen built a 200 square meter steel-frame house to farm cockroaches, which is comprised of three parts. After that, he bought more than 100 kilos of eggs at yuan130,000 per kilo (VND450,000) and began producing cockroaches with the assistance of four “Chinese experts).

At first, the “experts” lived at Nguyen’s house to show him how to farm cockroaches. Later, when Nguyen could master the farming technique, three have left, while only one still stays to supervise the farming and give advice.

According to Nguyen, every kilo of eggs can provide 16,000 cockroaches, and every kilo of eggs can make 40-50 kilos of dried cockroaches.

The main food of cockroaches could be bran, young tea leaves, melon, corn, bone powder, beans, peanuts…

Especially, Nguyen said it is easy to breed cockroaches. “They only catch some simple diseases,” he said.

Dried cockroaches would be sold to the Chinese merchants from Shandong province. The average selling price is VND1.7 million per kilo.

A major environmental disaster

Nguyen introduced the reporters, who said they wanted to learn how to farm cockroaches, with Giang Trieu V, 55, a Chinese Vietnamese. V, who affirmed he had deep knowledge about the species of cockroach, said the black beetle has been farmed on a large scale in China. This is a precious material for making medicine; therefore, farming cockroaches has been bringing big money to Chinese farmers.

“We bring the cockroaches to Vietnam to help Vietnamese get rich,” V said.

“This is a very potential career. Try to farm cockroaches and don’t worry about the consumption, because we will buy all you have,” V said.

However, Vietnamese competent agencies have warned that the cockroaches would bring many diseases to Vietnam.

Nguyen Van Trong, Deputy Head of the Animal Husbandry Department of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (MARD), has affirmed that the Vietnamese farmers have violated the current laws when they spontaneously imported the cockroaches for farming in Vietnam. The organism is not found in the list of the livestock allowed to be farmed.

Dr. Vu Duc Chinh, a scientist, has denied the fact that the cockroaches can be used to make medicine.

“There has been no scientific research which says cockroaches can be the material for making medicine to cure people,” he said.

“Vietnamese should learn the lessons from the import of yellow snails, red-ear turtles--the exotic harmful species,” he said.

On March 7, MARD released a decision, stipulating that Vietnam strictly prohibits the import of cockroaches and will heavily punish the cockroach farmers.

Dan Viet