When leaving Hai Duong for the Central Highlands under the new economic zone program, Hoang Van Tron, born in 1973, spent many years collecting durian from provinces in the Central Highlands and the south to re-sell to retailers.

When collecting durian from farmers, he realized that durian has high economic value and a long fruit-bearing period. 

In early 2018, he bought nine hectares of land in Krieng commune in Duc Co district to grow durian.

When he turned over the soil to grow durian, people believed that it was foolish to grow durian on land where no plant can exist, so they called him crazy.

Despite people’s ridicule, he still believed that he would succeed. After growing durian on the land, Chin once again traveled everywhere to collect durians for sale.

With the money he earned from the business as well as borrowed money, he has bought more land and expanded the growing area. Now he owns 100 hectares of durian, including 20 hectares of 5-6-year old durian and 60 hectares of 2-3-year old durian. He is going to plant another 20 hectares.

Two years ago, a Chinese businessman came to see him and said he wanted to buy his orchard for VND100 billion, but he turned down the deal.

He plans to harvest 200 tons of durian this year from the 20 hectares of 5-6-year old durian, worth VND15 billion. After several more years, when the entire durian orchard can produce fruit, he will have 3,000 tons of durian from his 100 hectares of growing area.

He is now employing 20 local workers to develop his orchard, spending VND300 million on labor cost a month.

With the current durian growing area, he is the biggest grower in Duc Co district. He has become well known in the locality and is called ‘Durian King’ by locals.

He said durian needs a lot of water. It needs watering for seven months a year. To ensure enough water for his 18,000 durian trees, in addition to natural stream water, he has drilled 13 water wells.   

However, his orchard still lacked water in the latest drought. He had to install a pipeline system to bring water from Chu Prong district 10 kilometers away.

Tran Hoan