Viet Nam: Growing Vegetables against All Odds on Spratly Islands

Jun 11, 2019 | Hồng Minh, Viet Nam News
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As the last-born in a four-children family with two brothers and one sister in the central province of Quảng Ngãi, 21-year-old Phan Gia Cường never had to worry about cooking or planting vegetables for daily meals as he had his loving mother to do all of those chores. But the young man soon realised the importance of self-sufficiency and learned how to cultivate vegetables after joining the navy soldier troop on Đá Thị (Petley) Reef, a coral rock 322 nautical miles from Cam Ranh Peninsula, which is part of Việt Nam’s Spratly Islands.