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After the Covid-19 epidemic was under control, eateries and restaurants reopened, the demand for goat meat was increasing and goat prices rose. With a good income from goat farming, many households in Dong Nai and Binh Phuoc provinces have poured money to build cages to increase their herd from the beginning of the year.
The Southern Province of Dong Nai currently has a herd of about 40,000 goats and places with large pastures and many agricultural by-products in districts of Xuan Loc, Thong Nhat, Long Thanh, Cam My, Tan Phu are very suitable for raising goats for meat. Breeder Trinh Dinh Xuan in Song Ray Commune in Cam My District who is raising 150 meat goats disclosed that the current price of meat goats is about VND120,000 a kg doubling that during the peak of the Covid-19 epidemic, so goat farmers are very happy. Farmer Xuan added that during the Covid-19 epidemic, livestock households reduced their herds and left empty cages whereas they are planning to increase their herd now because food service establishments are bustling again, and the demand for goat meat is very huge.
In the Southern Province of Binh Phuoc, hundreds of households in two districts bordering Cambodia, Loc Ninh and Bu Dop, are earning a good income from goat farming. For instance, breeder Pham Dinh Dung in Loc Quang Commune is raising more than 100 goats. In 2022, when the Covid-19 epidemic was under control, the goat price began to increase ranging from VND120,000 to VND140,000 a kg, and Mr. Dung's family earned about VND200 million.
One of the successful goat farming models which have helped many households in the province become well-off families is the goat farming cooperative group in Tan Thanh Commune in Bu Dop District. The 40-member cooperative is raising a total herd of more than 1,600 female goats and 40 male goats that are fed with natural plants. The cooperative has offered regular jobs for more than 100 female workers and its members can make hundreds of millions of Vietnamese dongs per year.
However, the problem of connecting output for livestock products in the Southeast provinces is still facing difficulties because most of them are small livestock households and cooperatives sell products to local traders, so the prices are still low. Therefore, the agricultural authority in Cam My District recommended that goat farmers should not increase their herd massively because at this time the price of input materials is still high; In order to ensure economic efficiency, farmers only re-herd and increase their herd when they fully ensure the conditions of facilities. More importantly, breeders necessarily implement safe husbandry measures in the process of raising.
Breeder Ngo Duc Nhat in the Southern Province of Binh Phuoc’s Loc Ninh District said that at the time of the Covid-19 outbreak, his family had hundreds of meat goats that could not be sold because of low prices. From mid-2022 until now, the price of goats has increased, so he has sold goats many times. Currently, Mr. Nhat's goat herd is always stable at about 60-70 heads, and he has sold 7-10 meat goats to traders each time.
According to the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development of Binh Phuoc province, the province has more than 17,000 hectares of pepper, of which more than two-thirds of the area is grown with live tree venom, creating favorable conditions for the development of a model of pepper growing in combination with goat farming. Presently, the current pepper price fluctuated unpredictably, and the high price of goats has helped many farmers increase their income and improve their lives. Though the price of goats is now very high, the local agricultural department still recommended that people should be cautious when increasing the herd to avoid risks and losses.
