Biodigesters, Sustainable Development, and the Vietnam village life…

I know it's been a while since my last post, but I'm alive and well, not to worry! We got back last night from an extremely busy, exhausting, intense, and rewarding two week adventure in the Mekong River Delta. I don't have that much time right now to write about the entire two week experience, so I am going to right now just write about building biodigesters. The next two weeks I will be here in HCMC living with my third and final home stay, so my schedule will be much more routine than I have experienced in the last month (which has been everything BUT routine), so I would rather not rush writing about this incredible two week adventure, but instead spread out my postings as I have time over the next week or so.

The focus of this excursion was rural development study, and we certainly did exactly that. We had various lectures about sustainable development at Can Tho University and on the farms we worked on, learned about the alternative methods in agricultural and farming practice that are both more economically and environmentally beneficial, and met with members of the Women Union and Farmer Association in My Khanh village. The trip culminated with actually being able to put these alternative methods to use as we built two biodigesters for two separate farmers throughout the two week experience. For those of you who are not familiar with a biodigester (I certainly wasn't before this experience), let me give a brief description. They basically are the most simple, yet manageable way to assure the interconnectedness within a farming system. The biodigesters we built are made from plastic, so they only cost about $100 to build. The process begins in the pig sty, where at least four pigs must be present for this system to operate properly. The pig waste from this sty travels through a system of small pipes into a large plastic container, which is about 10 meters x 1 meter. From this container some of the waste is used as compost and the remaining waste is released into the fish pond, which in turn feeds the algae, zooplankton, and the fish. In fact, 50% of the fish food is supplied by this biodigester system (cutting ½ of a farmer's budget for fish food). In addition to the fish food provided by this system, the electricity for the farmer's house is powered by the CH4 (methane) that also comes from the biodigester of pig waste. In essence, this interconnected system cuts down on the costs farmers must pay for fish food and electricity, is much more sanitary, cuts down on the time women must spend in the kitchen (charcoal grills take a long time to clean), and it is sustainable and economical.

It would have been one thing to simply learn about this concept from a book. But instead we got to see it come to life for two separate farmers. The first farm that we installed the biodigester was a pretty unique situation. The woman is a widow since her husband and three children died recently from illness. She is extremely poor and vulnerable, yet she has four pigs so she has the capacity to begin use of this biodigester system. SIT provided the funds to build this biodigester since this woman was only financially capable enough to provide the terra cotta pipes used on either side of the plastic tube. Meeting this woman was just about as upsetting as her story sounds. Her home and land were both in pretty terrible condition. Throughout the entire process, which takes at least four hours, she was standing beside us watching, smiling, wiping tears from her face, and pouring coconut milk from coconuts she picked off of nearby trees for us to drink as we worked. The process is fairly simple, but it definitely took all 8 of us in addition to Bac Hai (the village man who began this process of installing biodigesters in this village – there are about 30 now) in order to complete the process. We overlapped layers of plastic to make a three layer plastic "chamber" to be used for the pig waste, and cut tires to make rubber pieces used to wrap around the terra cotta pipes on either side of the main container. We spent nearly an hour in thick, bubbling, brown mud digging the hole for this large plastic contraption to be placed. We also went through a similar process to create the plastic chamber for the gas to be held. We then had to actually assemble these pieces into the ground and hang the gas chamber over the pig sty. The pigs were so cute! Actually the mother I thought was a disgusting creature… I don't know how I eat so much pork in this country. The little baby pigs were so cute though. One of them had a broken foot because the mother pig stepped on it. Its leg was completely blue and we were told that it would likely not survive. Even though there are instances like this of pig sickness, it is interesting to contrast these types of farms that we learned about and experienced in rural Vietnamese villages with the large scale pig industry farms in the U.S. where they basically just shoot up their pigs with all sorts of antibiotics. Here, because there are so few pigs within each farm, the rates of disease are much lower. We learned a lot these past two weeks about Vietnamese development in terms of the farmer-to-farmer relationship. That is, because Vietnam is still on the cusp of all out development, farmers still rely heavily on learning from one another. This is called the "copy cat" syndrome. So in this case of the pigs, farmers copy each other on ways to heal pig sickness based on different situations and instances of pig sickness and recovery. We saw this "copy cat" syndrome even more real when we built the second biodigester in a village where no biodigesters have been built before and where farmers looked over our shoulders and worked with us to learn how this system works. After we completed this project, which was only after much sweating, mosquito bites, extreme mud, and exhaustion, we realized how rewarding and unique this experience was. Even though what we did was seemingly minor and not that significant (although exhausting nonetheless), we literally changed this woman's life. Her daily life will be completely reinvented with this biodigester in place.

I found another incredible part of this experience to be learning about how to build the biodigesters from the farmers earlier in the day. Over lunch of hot pot (a very traditional southern Vietnam food – a small stove top is placed in the middle of the table and broth, vegetables, fish, pineapple, and other spices are cooked together), the two main farmers of the village took out a large, dirty, and tattered at the edges piece of paper. On this paper, they drew a simple diagram of the biodigester and its main physical components. These two men, standing barefoot with dirty pants and shirts, each barely over 5 feet tall, were able to communicate us with their basic farmer to farmer talk (through translation of course) and really be able to explain this process and the incredible impacts it has had on farmers in this area. Something was so simple about their explanation, but so insightful too. In general, this whole community in the first village where we built the biodigester was so grateful to us. They flooded us with food, the best fruits I have ever had (definitely the best pineapple in my entire life), coconut milk, smiles, rice wine, and just a general sense of gratitude towards our work which almost seemed tangible to us as we worked. One farmer was so excited by our work in his village that he literally RAN into his fish pond from the pit of mud in which we were digging and caught a GIGANTIC tilapia for us to put in our hot pot for lunch that day. He ran out of his pond with this huge fish (probably a good 17-20 inches long, still alive and flapping everywhere), still dripping water down his bare back and smiling to show us the fish he caught for us. That day for lunch we had the freshest and most delicious fish I have ever eaten! Although I had a bit of hesitation eating a fish that was alive an hour before, it was really delicious. In fact, all food in this area was pretty unique due to its freshness. Nearly every tree in the Mekong Delta is a fruit tree, so fruit is the most abundant aspect of Mekong Delta culture. All sorts of spikey and colorful objects I learned were fruits. And delicious fruits too!

The second biodigester we built later in the week in a different village. It was a bit more of an urbanized village, but also fascinating because it was the first biodigester to be installed in the entire village. At least a dozen farmers in the area came to watch the process and learn from it. They were all laughing the entire time, which Co Thanh (academic director) explained to be a part of the folk culture. I was feeling pretty sick on this particular day, so the 85 plus degree day combined with humidity really did a number on me. At the time it was pretty miserable, but looking back on this entire manual labor experience of building biodigesters was truly incredible. We had the opportunity to work side by side the most simple, yet brilliant farmers in some of the most remote places I have ever been to on earth. We got to challenge the stereotype of American college students. We got to learn and experience an interconnected system that has the capacity to change the lives of everyday farmers. We got to see the gratitude in the farmer's faces! I worried studying abroad in a country with so much poverty like Vietnam would make me feel helpless, sad, and depressed. Instead, I am so grateful to my academic director for recognizing that small deeds like this one can literally change the lives of farmers and simultaneously make us feel like members of this culture as well.

I know this is just one small story, but I promise more will come trickling in over the next week or so. Things have been unbelievably busy, but hopefully moving in with my home stay tomorrow and starting a more routine schedule will make things settle down a bit. I'm looking forward to it all as usual!