Changes in Plantation Activities of Ta-oi, Co-tu and Bru-Van Kieu People in Two Provinces of Quang Tri and Thua-Thien Hue

Abstract

The State’s sedentarization policy has brought fundamental changes to the lives of ethnic minority people, including the diverse change of plantation activities among three ethnicities, namely Ta-oi, Co-tu and Bru-Van Kieu in two provinces of Quang Tri and Thua-Thien Hue. From the swidden monocultivation, these ethnic minority people have changed waste land into wet rice fields as well as have transformed some rice fields from rice, corn and cassava to cash crops, etc. The application of new varieties together with modern cultivation techniques has led to important changes of productivity and yield of crops. The positive results in plantation show the right path in crop restructuring among these three ethnicities which has made contribution to hungry eradication and poverty reduction, improvement of quality of ethnic minority lives. However, this change also poses many questions such as outputs for cash crop products, instability of markets and prices of agricultural products, the gradual disappearance of traditional knowledge of ethnicities and the negative impacts of use of chemicals in plantation on living environment.