Dong Nai (VNS/VNA) - Fruit growers who offer tourismservices in their orchards in Dong Nai province are diversifying their productsto attract tourists and increase incomes.

The southeastern region’s largest fruit producing province hasmore than 70,000ha of orchards and is well known for fruits such as durian,grapefruit, orange, mandarin, and custard apple.

Major fruit growing districts like Tan Phu, Vinh Cuu, Cam My, XuanLoc, and Long Thanh and Long Khanh city have expanded orchard tourism servicesin recent years.

Besides traditional specialty fruits like small-seed durian andmangosteen, farmers grow new ones such as Musang King durian to serve tourists.

In Vinh Cuu district’s Tan Binh commune, Tan Trieu riverine islandis well known for ‘buoi duong la cam’, a local specialitygrapefruit, and many orchard owners here offer tourism services.

They also make various products from the fruit such as wine, jam,essential oil, grapefruit milk tea, and salads to serve tourists.

Lam Phi Hung, owner of Sau Hung Ecological Orchard in Long Khanh city,was the first farmer to use a QR code in Binh Loc commune.

Tourists can scan the code to check information about him, thetypes of fruits he grows and their yields, and the location of the orchard.

Binh Loc commune, the largest fruit growing area in Long Khanh city,grows many speciality fruits including durian, rambutan and mangosteen.

Farming households in the commune have linked up to developtourism and adopt VietGAP and other quality standards.

Long Khanh city now has more than 100 households who join hands tooffer tourism services in their orchards.

The city receives tens of thousands of tourists visiting itsorchards every day.

Dong Nai has identified tourism as one of its key sectors and havinghuge potential for developing eco-tourism related to orchards, forests,waterfalls, rivers, and lakes.

It received 2.2 million tourists last year, including 75,000foreigners, almost double the number in 2021, according to its Department ofCulture, Sports and Tourism.

It hopes to welcome 2.7 million visitors this year, including80,000 foreigners, and earn revenues of 1.7 trillion VND (72 million USD), 40%higher than last year.

Under the national programme for building new-style rural areas,the province has invested in infrastructure in rural areas, especially roads,creating favourable conditions for orchard owners to offer tourism services.

The province has organised trips for farmers to other provinces tosee for themselves how agricultural tourism models work.

Farmers in the province are increasingly using advancedtechniques, good agricultural practices (GAP) and organic farming standards toimprove their tourism services.

Truong Phat Agricultural Service Cooperative in Nhon Trach district’sLong Tan commune grows organic lotus and offers tourism services.

Nguyen Thi Bich Le, its director, said tourists could watch howlotus is grown and harvested and products are made from it.

“Tourism services help the co-operative create added value forlotus and promote its organic lotus products.”

Many orchard owners plan to increase co-operation among themselvesto diversify tourism products.

According to Van Thanh Doan, owner of a flower garden in Xuan Loc district’sXuan Bac commune, its highlight is the diverse variety of flowers, but he alsogrows fruits and offers a variety of foods to meet tourists’ requirements.

“Our long-term target is to expand the linkages between localorchards to develop closed tourism service chains from visiting orchards,offering food and providing other speciality tourism products,” he said.

The province also has many craft villages that make well-knownproducts such as fine art furniture, pottery, dried banana, and grapefruitwine.

But the linkages between orchards, craft villages and tourismdestinations are tenuous, according to the province People’s Committee.

Most craft villages produce and sell what they make and do notresearch to find out what the market and tourists want.

Most tourists visit the province for just one day and spend anaverage of 500,000 VND (21 USD), the People’s Committee said.

If the province could keep tourists overnight, their spendingwould double or triple, it added./.