In the early 90s, Thao Din was one of 34 Mong households in the highland commune of Din Chin, Muong Khuong district, who moved to live in the border village of Coc Phuong, Ban Lau commune. At that time, the name Coc Phuong was unfamiliar even to people in the district, because the village was far from the center, had difficult transportation, and was close to the border, isolated from the outside world. When he first settled in Coc Phuong, he and many other people had to go to the other side of the border to work for hire in exchange for rice to support their families; the hired job there was picking pineapples for hire.

“I go to work during the day and at night I keep thinking, people are just across the stream from me, their hills are no different from mine, but they have become rich from growing pineapples to growing bananas, while my villagers have been poor for years and have to work for hire… I work and observe, learn pineapple growing techniques, especially how to mix biological chemicals to stimulate pineapples to grow big and beautiful. When I was sure I could grow pineapples like them, I saved my wages to buy pineapple seeds,” Mr. Din confided.

In the first pineapple crop (late 1994), Mr. Din bought more than 10,000 pineapple plants and mobilized his wife, children, and brothers to carry them up the hill to plant. When the pineapples took root, he hired people in the village to weed and fertilize according to the process he had learned. More than a year later, when the pineapple hill bore ripe fruit, the whole family was overjoyed. But when the harvest season came, another obstacle arose because at that time, from the commune center to Coc Phuong, there was only a small path, and trucks could not get to the hill to buy. So he had to hire people to carry each heavy basket of pineapples several kilometers before selling them. After deducting the investment cost, the remaining wages did not yield much profit.

The second crop, he saved all the money in the house, then borrowed more money to plant 10,000 more trees, but it seemed like God wanted to test people. When he had just harvested 10 tons of pineapples, it rained continuously, causing most of the ripe pineapples to rot. That crop, Thao Din lost more than 10 million VND.

When faced with difficulties, Thao Din tried 5 or 10 times harder. The following year, he discussed with his wife to borrow more money from the bank to buy 30,000 pineapple seedlings. This season, Thao Din carefully calculated the planting time so that the pineapples would ripen at the right time without encountering unfavorable weather. The pineapple crop was good and the price was good, thanks to that, he was able to pay off all his debts and have money to invest in expanding the area. After pineapple, Thao Din also learned the technique of growing bananas in tissue culture and successfully applied it to the strip of land along Coc Phuong and Na Loc streams. Now, Mr. Din's family has one of the largest banana and pineapple growing areas in the commune, earning several hundred million VND each year.

Following Thao Din, the Mong people in Coc Phuong replaced corn with pineapple, bringing in much higher income, pushing back poverty, and making life increasingly better. Successful with pineapple, the Mong people here also grow bananas using tissue culture for export. Bananas are grown in low places along streams, pineapples are grown in high mountains, the green color of prosperity and abundance covers the wasteland.

Starting from Coc Phuong, now all villages in Ban Lau grow pineapples and bananas, becoming a specialized commodity production area with more than 1,500 hectares. Each year, bringing tens of billions of dong to the people, Coc Phuong now has no poor households, 70% are well-off and rich households. The prosperous border area helps people feel secure in protecting the border markers with the Border Guard.

Coming to Ban Lau today, it is not difficult to see houses that are built spaciously and have modern designs no less than those in the lowlands. Provincial Road 154 - the road connecting National Highway 4D Lao Cai - Muong Khuong to Pac Bo, Na Loc, Coc Phuong villages... has been invested by the State with an investment capital of up to tens of billions of VND, and has just been inaugurated and put into use a few months before Tet At Ty, helping people's travel and trade of goods become more and more convenient.

It is known that in 2024, the whole commune has 848 hectares of pineapples for harvest, with a yield of 26 tons/ha, achieving a total output of more than 22,000 tons of fruit, sold to Muong Khuong Export Vegetable and Fruit Processing Factory and the provinces of Bac Giang, Ninh Binh, Thanh Hoa, Quang Ninh... bringing in more than 132 billion VND for the people. Thanks to that, most of the houses have been solidly built, many are 2-3 storey houses, fully equipped with modern living facilities, children are fully educated, and there are no social evils. People are assured to settle down, develop production, and together with the Border Guard to firmly protect the sovereignty and security of the national border...