Western gardeners ‘make a fortune’ selling green-skinned grapefruit for Tet

Green-skinned grapefruit, weighing 1.2 – 1.5 kg, is being sought by traders, with prices ranging from VND35,000/kg to VND40,000/kg. On May 27, Mr. Huynh Quang Duc – Deputy Director of the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development of Ben Tre – said that after a period of stagnation, traders have recently begun to seek green-skinned grapefruit from gardeners in Ben Tre.

“This is also a signal that green-skinned grapefruit has new export orders,” Mr. Duc said.

According to the same day’s records, green-skinned grapefruit gardens in Ben Tre province are showing signs of recovery after many months of drought and salinity. People have begun to fertilize grapefruit trees when the irrigation water source is abundant.

Mr. Huynh Van Quan – known as the “King of Pomelos in Coconut Land”, residing in Chau Thanh District, Ben Tre Province – said that since the Lunar New Year 2024 until now, the low price of pomelos has caused difficulties for gardeners.

“However, this type of pomelo is currently very rare in gardeners due to the effects of drought and salinity,” Mr. Quan said. The average purchase price at the garden is about 23,000 – 25,000 VND/kg.

According to Mr. Nguyen Van Le – a green-skin pomelo trader in Ben Tre Province, companies are currently actively collecting the best pomelos for export to foreign markets. However, the amount of pomelos in the West is currently very small, especially pomelos that meet export standards are even rarer.

“Only 10 – 20% of the pomelos in the whole pomelo garden are of good quality, so we have to search everywhere to collect enough goods. But each day we can only collect a few hundred kilos,” Mr. Le said.

Ben Tre currently has nearly 6,000 hectares of green-skin pomelos, accounting for 20% of the province’s fruit tree area.