Drought-tolerant watermelon farming

On August 8th, 2013, 18 households in Thai Duong Thuong Cooperatives, Hai Duong Commune, joined an on spot seminar to review the watermelon model after two months of growing. This activity was conducted as part of the VM031 project "Community Based Disaster Risk Mitigation and Climate Change Adaptation” in Huong Tra Town, Thua Thien Hue Province funded by Caristas Australia through the Centre for Sustainable Rural Development (SRD).

          Agricultural specialist provides farmers instructions on preventing pests on watermelons. (Source: SRD)

This is the second year in which the project expands the drought-tolerant watermelon planting. During summers, some areas of the paddy fields in Hai Duong Commune are left uncultivated due to the shortage of irrigation water. The watermelon growing, therefore, helps local farmer to take use of the fallow land and create an additional livelihood for them. According to Ms. Thuy – a farmer who has cultivated watermelon most efficiently in the commune, watermelons planted in Hai Duong Commune are famous for its sweet taste from a combination of the salinity of the sea and sweet of sugar.

In 2012, the drought-tolerant watermelon variety produced a yield of 550kg/sao (1 “sao” = 500 m2). After deducting investment costs, the farmers gained a profit of approximate 2.050.000 VNĐ/sao. However, the 2013 crop has witnessed a decrease of nearly 50% in income, which is attributed to the inconvenient weather. In fact, there were 4 heavy rains occurring on 17th, 25th of June and 2nd and 14th of July. As a result, the heavy rains have been detrimental to the flowering and fruiting of watermelon plants, increased the risk of pestilent insects and killed the plants due to water-logging. In addition, the head of the cooperative told that the watermelon crop was affected by the transmission of diseases and pests from nearby rice paddies. If watermelon farming households do not pay good care of their crop, the quality and productivity, without doubt, will decline.

Watermelon plants are highly sensitive to weather. Therefore, in the context of unpredictable weather, it is important for watermelon cultivators to spend time and effort on growing and follow technical guidance so as to achieve efficient production.      

Agricultural specialist provides farmers instructions on preventing pests on watermelons. (Source: SRD)

-SRD-