HA TINH – People in Phuc Trach commune, Huong Khe district, cut Do Bau trees to get agarwood to sell, selling more than 10 million VND/kg.

Phuc Trach Commune is the capital of Do Bau (also known as Do Tram) in Ha Tinh, with nearly 2,000 producing households. On average, each household owns from one sao to several tens of hectares of land and grows from 50 to thousands of trees.

Mature trees are 20 m tall, 30-40 cm in diameter and 8-10 m wide. After 7 to 10 years, the trunk that appears many holes means that there is natural bass will be kept. With trees without holes, people started drilling, punching holes in the trunk, applying oil inside to stimulate the tree to produce oil. After 2.5 years, the trees that have drilled holes can be harvested.

In Phuc Trach commune, there are many cooperatives and households that manufacture and trade in agarwood. Every week, they come to ask the gardeners to buy trees, then hire workers to trim the branches, see them, and put them on trucks.

Fresh do gourd tree has the lowest price of one million dongs, about 70 million dongs high. Some rare and perennial plants sell for more than 200 million dongs.

Mr. Nguyen Xuan Thuy (46 years old, left corner) is carving a log to find the bass inside. Hien Linh Agarwood Cooperative, where Mr. Thuy is working as Deputy Director, specializes in selling agarwood and handicraft products from agarwood, with 5-6 regular employees.

When hewing the log into small pieces of wood, seeing the appearance of black agarwood, the worker will stop. They then used chisels to trim the white wood, leaving the dark black part. The pruners and pruners are usually middle-aged, experienced people, with a daily salary of 250,000 VND.

“Doing this job requires perseverance. With winding bass veins, I have to carefully use an iron chisel with small hooks to scrape every bit of wood. When I encounter large chunks of gourd, complicated bass circuits, it took me dozens of days to create a piece. beautiful low-scenes song,” said Mr. Phan Van Minh, 53 years old, residing in Phuc Trach commune.

Pieces of raw agarwood are taken out by workers from the Do Bau tree at the Hien Linh facility. One kilogram of agarwood sells for 10 million VND or more.

On average, a tree about 3 m high, 2 cm in diameter, made by the people themselves, will take out about 4-5 ounces of agarwood. For trees with natural holes, the volume of agarwood is not uniform and difficult to measure.

Customers often take small pieces of incense, light it on fire to check the quality of the fragrance before deciding to pay the purchase price. “Standard agarwood usually has a mild fragrance, only people in the profession can feel it,” said Mr. Bui Thuc Chinh, resident of Phuc Trach commune.

Many people also make large ornamental trees for sale. The price of a bonsai tree ranges from 2 million dongs to tens or hundreds of millions of dongs, with products worth more than a billion dong.

“Depression scenes are often bought by people with economic and feng shui enthusiasts to decorate their homes or use as gifts. Sometimes they buy according to their emotions, if they see it as beautiful, they buy it without paying much attention to the price.” Mr. Pham Anh Tuan, 56 years old, residing in Huong Khe town, shared.

When all the agarwood is removed, the wood chips and the pruned carcass of the tree will be dried in the sun for a few days to cook essential oils, or put in a blender to get powdered incense.

One kilogram of the pruned carcass will grind 7-8 ounces of Agarwood powder.

Incense is produced from the power of the tree, which is fragrant, non-toxic.

People will put wood chips and pruned corpses into a large pan, then cook, connect the faucet to the boiler to distill the essential oil.

Frankincense essential oil has medicinal uses, helping to prevent infections. According to Mr. Pham Anh Tuan, agarwood essential oil has high economic value, costs tens to hundreds of millions of dong a liter, sometimes a liter sells for approximately billions of dollars.

In addition to selling pieces of agarwood, agarwood is also made into jewelry. Currently, families and agarwood production facilities in Phuc Trach commune often sell to customers in the markets of Hue, Quang Binh, Khanh Hoa… After deducting the cost of raw materials and labor, one household or business earns tens to hundreds of millions of dong per month.

According to the leader of Phuc Trach commune, Do Bau is a tree of high economic value, and the government encourages people to develop it. Annually, the total revenue from selling trees and making agarwood products is more than VND 50 billion.Follow (vnexpress)