“In previous years, my husband and I often bought the whole garden, from when the lychee was still green until harvest, we would sell it to traders. Now the lychee is in the right season for the outbreak, so my husband and I decided to switch to drying and selling dry cloth. Because it was too urgent, I didn’t have time to make a drying oven, so after I harvested fresh lychees, I rented them to dry them and then sell them on my personal page as well as online market groups,” Thuy said. The price of dried fabric is halved compared to every year Ms. Thuy said that the drying time for a batch of fabric ranges from 5 to 6 days, depending on the drying process of each kiln owner. A satisfactory batch of dried lychee is that the lychee fruit must have uniform color, sharp sweetness, flexibility and a very characteristic aroma. Due to the impact of the epidemic, the price of dried lychee this year is much lower than every year. According to Ms. Thuy, in previous years, the average price of dried lychee was from 120,000-150,000 VND/kg, this year the price fluctuates around 60,000 VND/kg. This price is for Thuy and her husband to make it public on their sales page. She and her husband only do wholesale, not retail, with a minimum order of 10kg. Customers taking in large quantities, from 50kg or more, I will reduce the price a little more. “Because I have been selling for nearly 15 years, the number of regular customers is very large. There are customers who order immediately at 2-3 quintals, on average I output about 4 quintals a day. In less than a week, I sold 1.5 tons of dried lychees,” she said. Thuy and her husband only wholesale dried cloth for customers who buy 10kg or more “Actually, this year, I switched to selling dried lychees like this and didn’t make much profit. However, due to the Covid-19 epidemic, I want to join hands so that litchi growers don’t suffer much damage.” The woman shared that if the dried fabric meets the standards, it can be preserved for a whole year. Dried lychee can be used to eat directly, soak in alcohol or use to cook tea, as a spice for traditional Chinese medicine. How to choose a drying cloth In the market, there are many establishments that sell dried fabrics, but to choose quality dried fabrics, it is necessary to pay attention to buy them at reputable addresses. The dried fruit must be large, the outer skin is dry evenly, keep its shape or slightly dented. Dried fabric can be kept for a long time Especially when peeling, the lychee must be flexible, have a characteristic aroma, sweet taste, peel off without sticking to your hands, and have a dark color of cockroach wings. Long litchi with black color means it has been burnt, while long with light brown color means that it has not been dried enough, must be used immediately and cannot be stored for a long time. Methods of preservation In order to preserve the dried fabric for a long time, when we buy the fabric, we dry it under 2 or 3 times in the sun. During the drying process, pay attention to turning the fabric to the sun, and the fabric to dry evenly. Then put it in the shade to dry in the wind for another 3, 4 days, then put it in a tightly tied plastic bag. When storing, about 2-3 months, you should open the cloth bag to check the probability of a few fruits to see if the dried fabric is still of good quality or has been moldy, damaged or opaque. If you store a lot, every few months, you should take the fabric out to dry in the sun and follow the exact same preservation process for the first time, thus ensuring that the dried fabric can be kept delicious and nutritious for years to come.

Mr. Tran Van Hai from Lang Son said that for the past few years, his family has specialized in purchasing, preliminarily processing and refining all kinds of cake wrapping leaves. In the past, people only took bamboo to make their house, cook, make firewood, make cakes and leave the leaves behind. But in the past few years, fresh bamboo leaves have been picked up by many people, bought and sold to traders who export to Taiwan for 10,000 VND/kg fresh bamboo leaves and 40,000 VND/kg dried bamboo leaves. Eight degree bamboo leaves are purchased and exported to Taiwan Đài “Myself and my family never thought that bamboo leaves could be sold abroad. It was not until a contact to buy bamboo leaves for traditional cake packages in Taiwan made me know that bamboo leaves could be sold and exported to foreign countries. From there, my family went to get bamboo leaves to sell. When the collection is not enough, hire more workers and advertise online to buy bamboo leaves in other localities in any quantity, “said Mr. Hai. According to Mr. Hai, with fresh bamboo leaves, he buys them for 7,000-10,000 VND/kg. As for dried bamboo leaves, he buys them for 35,000-40,000 VND/kg. All must be octagonal bamboo leaves (also known as Buong). The weights of bamboo leaves are purchased to ensure the quality criteria, the leaves must be large, not torn, still green and absolutely not yellow. Each leaf is about 38-40cm long, 8cm wide or more. “Bamboo is very different from ordinary bamboo leaves. They are much larger in size. When bought, fresh bamboo leaves will be exposed to the sun for about 2 days. The leaves are then counted and clamped onto a bamboo stick. At this time, dry clean, bring bamboo leaves into the oven to dry and then sort and pack,” Hai said. The bamboo leaves that are completely cleaned by natural and chemical-free methods will be exported to Taiwan to be used as packaging materials for cakes, food packages, etc., and are loved by the people of this country due to its taste delicious and long lasting. “The type of cake that the Taiwanese side often wraps with bamboo leaves is like Vietnamese chung cake. However, because it is wrapped with bamboo leaves, the cake has a characteristic aroma. In addition, the type of cake wrapped from this leaf is very easy to peel, keeps for a long time and does not go stale as quickly as seaweed and banana leaves. From the end of April to October of the solar calendar every year is the autumn to buy eight degrees of bamboo leaves. Therefore, many personal facebook groups go to groups to sell and buy fresh and dried bamboo leaves in unlimited quantities. There, the atmosphere was jubilant because many bamboo growers in different places asked about the purchase price as well as the instructions for collecting and transporting fresh and dried bamboo leaves. For long-term business cooperation, all establishments that register to sell fresh and dried bamboo leaves Mr. Hai come to the place to collect and check. “I have to go down to the place to instruct the individual establishments that collect bamboo leaves to ensure that the leaves are not torn, beautiful green color and especially large. Come to the place to see the specific item once. Next time, they just do that, then I decide to buy, avoid wasting both parties’ time, “he said. Currently in Yen Bai, Bac Giang, Thanh Hoa, Soc Son – Hanoi… there are a lot of people growing bamboo and poplar trees. They only use the tree and leave the leaves empty. Therefore, he went to teach how to collect leaves and now they become agents, helping his establishment to buy fresh and dried bamboo leaves up to a few kilos/day in the locality.

Laba banana is a famous specialty banana of Lam Dong land with the advantage of being very flexible, sweet and delicious. (Photo: dacsanhanydalat.com) After hanging persimmons are air-dried naturally according to Japanese and provincial technology Lam Dong Currently, this technology has been applied to produce dried Laba banana specialties. The product has been introduced to the market with an output of about 18 tons and is mainly consumed in Ho Chi Minh City. Product Laba bananas dried of Laba Trade and Service Cooperative (Phu Son commune, Lam Ha district) is produced based on the simulation of processes such as wind drying persimmon. Harvested old bananas are carefully selected, then put through a conveyor belt washed with clean water, then put into a dedicated warehouse to incubate bananas with an incubation temperature adjusted to 40 degrees Celsius to help bananas ripen evenly within 3. day. Ripe bananas are selected by workers, cut, peeled and put through 2 times of washing, after being cleaned, they are put in a fan drying oven to dry for more than 1 hour. After 36 hours put in the air dryer, it will produce 1 batch of dried bananas. Usually 8kg of fresh bananas will yield 1kg dried banana . Nguyen Tan Play, Chairman of Laba Trade and Service Cooperative, said that in the past time, the export of fresh bananas of the unit was severely affected by the COVID-19 epidemic, only 400 tons/year, or 20%. Quantity. Therefore, he and farmers learned about Japanese wind drying technology to apply banana drying, after many trials, it produced a finished product, avoiding the abandonment of ripe bananas and increasing the value of Laba bananas. . Laba banana is also known as “ banana advance king ,” is a famous specialty of Lam Dong province with the characteristics of thick skin, and the fruit’s flesh when ripe has a very delicious, flexible aroma. During the Nguyen Dynasty, Laba bananas were moved to Hue to serve in the meals of the king and the court. Currently, Laba bananas are grown a lot in Lam Ha, Duc Trong (Da Lat) and are very popular with tourists, looking to buy fresh bananas when traveling in Da Lat city.