At the beginning of the harvesting time, chilli prices fell dramatically to only VND 8,000 / kg due to Covid-19 disease. Farmers again struggled with chilli, while traders bought and converted to frozen red chilli wating for the Korean market up.
Before Lunar New Year 2020, fresh chilli prices were purchased at 15,000 VND / kg, but now only 8,000 VND / kg. With the above selling price, farmers fall into losses again.
Hopefully, the chili crop will salvage a little bit of capital, but chili prices will drop like fresh vegetables. Ms. Hoa harvested the first time of more than 600kg, sold nearly 500,000 VND. Fresh chilli is ripe for the second time, but the price is so cheap that Mrs. Hoa and her husband do not want to pick.
“Vietnamese chilli heavily depends on the Chinese market but local market does not consume much. With the price level of 8,000VND/ kg, farmers sufferred big losses, then they have to cut away to plant other types “- Ms. Hoa lamented.
This time in the fields of fresh chilli in Quang Ngai province, many areas of chili have reached the harvesting stage but farmers are not interested to pick.
According to chili growers, this time if harvesting chilli, selling price is not enough for labor fees, so many people leave it at the field. If the next few days, chili prices do not increase, farmers will have to cut it.
“Last year, at the beginning of the crop, price of fresh chilli was at 20,000 VND / kg, later it increased to more than 50,000 VND / kg. In this crop, however, the disease situation in China lasted for a long time and the losses were serious. Chili must be priced at 15,000 VND / kg to be profitable ”- Ms. Vo, a farmer said.
Mr. Chien, a fresh chili trader who has been selling chili through the Chinese market for more than 30 years, said that because of the influence of Covid-19, exports to China have been very limited.
At this time, Mr. Chien has sold three shipments only, instead of six as last year. The domestic demand is not very high, so chili price drops dramatically.
At present, in order to consume chilli for farmers, factories buy fresh chilli to to make red chilli frozen and wait for the Korean market stabilizing again. In addition, traders are looking for new markets for frozen chili pepper, such as Japan or Malaysia.
However, the new markets require high product quality, rigorous testing procedures and far less consumption quantity than the Chinese market.