A farm half way up a mountain is used by a group of Tay ethnic peopleto grow vegetables and raise fish, cattle and poultry communally. Thefarm is in tiny Ban Nghe Hamlet with 68 households in northern Bac Kanprovince where most farming is still done on a house-by-house basis. TheTay people in this mountainous poor hamlet traditionally grow rice,maize, soya beans and cassava. The idea of forming a communal farm was decided on by seven men, who each contributed their cultivated land to work together. "Initially,people from the seven households planted rice and raised cattle andpoultry together because our land is side by side," said Ma Van Nam,leader of the team. "The cultivated land here is rich, but Taypeople usually produce only one crop a year. However, local people hadbegun to demand fresh vegetables, so we planted some. The rest was apleasant surprise," Nam said. The vegetables grew fast and sold well. Market gardens created much higher incomes than planting rice. Early last year, the seven households decided to mortgage their land to expand their business. With 80 million VND (roughly 3,700 USD), they set up a farm to grow vegetables, raise fish, cattle and poultry. LuongVan Hung, the hamlet head and a member of the farm, said the idea ofmortgaging land doing cultivation together was really new for hispeople. "Doing a collective economic model was very strange. Manypeople thought that we were insane when we decided to take the risk ofgrowing vegetables," Hung added. The group members quickly foundout that to operate the farm professionally, they had to learn growingtechniques as well as accounting and marketing. Thanks toapplying these techniques to production, the 21ha-farm suppliesvegetables, fish and meat for the whole district and neighbouring areas. Their farm provides a stable income of about 80 million VND (3,700 USD) a year for each household. "At present, many other households would like to join us, but they hesitate", said Hung. Alongwith growing vegetable, breeding fishes, cattle and poultry, thefarmers also have 16ha of commercial timber trees. The area of forestalso has high promise. At present, the farm creates jobs for 14 regular workers with monthly income of 2 million VND (100 USD). Establishmentof the farm not only creates stable jobs and income, it supplies safevegetable and foods and also helps local people change their ways ofthinking. One of the difficulties for the farm group istransport, which can be costly, so there is talk of building a road fromthe hamlet to the farm. The economic model helps spread advancedtechnology and plant and animal diversification throughout the region,contributing to hunger and poverty reduction. The local authority has taken notice and said it intends to expand the model throughout the province.-VNA