A former party secretary makes a comeback with Boer goats, earning a living turning over 200 head a year on home-grown feed

In Phu Luong commune, Son Duong district, Tuyen Quang province in northern Vietnam, former party committee secretary Lai The Tuyen (born 1966) retired without waiting for retirement age to become the owner of a goat shed. In 2025 he used the early-retirement scheme (Decree 178) tied to the restructuring of the administrative apparatus to leave his post and turn to meat-goat farming centered on the South African Boer breed. Running more than 50 head at a time between fattening and breeding, he ships over 200 head a year and takes home, after tax and expenses, over 100 million dong a year (about 600,000 yen, converted at about 60 yen per 10,000 VND). The tale of going from official to goat herder, like the small-scale livestock farming in Nghe An where an electrician made a comeback with frog farming, is a real-life model of a livestock design started small in the mountains. For Japanese meat buyers, it is a story that offers a clue to what kind of operators Vietnam's goat-meat supply is born from.

A former party secretary chose a goat shed over a retirement payout

Mr. Tuyen was a local figure of standing who served as party committee secretary of Phu Luong commune. In 2025, Decree 178, which grants early retirement and a lump sum to officials subject to apparatus restructuring, took effect, and he stepped down in response. What he chose next was goat farming using the slope by his yard.

According to the report, he combines the Boer breed with native breeds, structuring the herd around a core of 30 to 40 fattening goats and about 10 breeding does. The fattening period from feeding to shipping is short, 2 to 3 months per head, and he runs four shipping cycles a year to sell off more than 200 head. That a person who left an important post made his post-retirement living self-reliant on fast-turnover livestock rather than relying on subsidies became a talking point locally.

Why the Boer breed? The reasons it is chosen as a meat goat

The Boer is a South African meat goat, a breed that has spread for fattening in Vietnam too for its good flesh quality and weight gain. According to livestock trade media, it reaches a body weight of 40 to 50 kg at 6 to 8 months of age, with a carcass yield of over 52%. Its meat is said to be firm and tender, with much lean, low-fat red meat.

Ease of rearing is also a reason the Boer is chosen. It grows on familiar plants such as grass, tree leaves and tubers, with high environmental adaptability and disease resistance. In Vietnam, besides the pure breed, a meat crossbreed with the native Bach Thao breed has also spread, and Mr. Tuyen's combination of "Boer plus native breed" is a standard design that takes both the speed of weight gain and hardiness to the land.

The substance of "rotation rearing" in numbers

Lining up Mr. Tuyen's farming in numbers, you can see that small scale and fast turnover coexist.

The crux lies in covering feed himself without buying it. He grows green-cut maize, bananas, acacia leaves and native tree leaves on a field of about 1,000 square meters, holding down dependence on purchased feed. Because feed cost does not weigh heavily as a fixed cost, the short cycle of finishing and selling in 2 to 3 months is a structure that ties directly to take-home pay.

Goat-meat demand, and distribution from region to table

What supports this way of earning is domestic goat-meat demand. In Vietnam, goat-meat consumption in dining out, starting with goat hotpot (lau de), is growing, and merchants who buy them live go around the farms. A survey of the livestock value chain brings out the procurement structure of eating establishments.

• The supply sources of goats handled by restaurants are 78.5% domestic farming, 20.7% live import from Laos, and 0.8% other. Domestic is the lead, but live imports also account for 20%.
• For restaurants' procurement sources, via middlemen is the largest at 67.2%, direct sourcing from farmers 19.6%, and slaughterhouses 13.2%. Many shops have the initiative held by middlemen.
• The shortfall is made up by frozen goat-meat imports from Australia, Argentina and New Zealand.

The structure of middleman dependence is a challenge common across livestock farming, and a major feed company's move to break middleman dependence through online pig trading overlaps with this too. If a farmer connects directly with restaurants and breeding-goat demand, as Mr. Tuyen does, the farmer's take grows.

Points Japanese sourcing and agriculture people should read

From this case, there are three points Japanese meat and produce buyers can take home.

First, Low-cost rotation fattening with homegrown feed, is the region-building model. He grows feed crops on a mountain slope and finishes in 2 to 3 months using almost no bought feed. Land and labor are required, but the raw-material cost is light and it is strong against market fluctuation. If you grasp what cost structure Vietnam's mountain livestock runs on, it becomes the foundation for price negotiation when sourcing live or frozen goat meat.

Second, The thickness of the exit of dining-out demand. Goat meat has stable domestic consumption centered on hotpot dishes, and domestic production alone is not enough, so it is made up by live and frozen imports. Flipped around, it is an item where supply has not caught up with demand, and if region-building advances, export capacity is also born. For the Japanese side, it is worth grasping that, while the main import sources are still skewed to Australia, New Zealand and Argentina, the option of Vietnamese product is growing.

Third, A change in the quality of the operators. The protagonist this time is a person who served in an important administrative post and is savvy about using systems and funds. With the early-retirement lump sum and local ties as seed capital, he launched a business not reliant on subsidies in a short time. Vietnam's livestock operators are spreading beyond simple smallholders to a layer with this kind of management sense. Here is the reality that the number of formidable counterparts to negotiate with in the region is growing.

Basic information on the case

Summary: how to follow the sprout of goat-meat "region-building"

What the former party committee secretary chose after retirement was rotation rearing of goats, turning familiar grass and trees into feed and finishing in 2 to 3 months. Even with a small herd, if the two conditions of homegrown feed and dining-out demand are met, take-home pay of over 100 million dong a year holds up. From here, there are three things Japanese stakeholders should follow. First, how the ratio of domestic goat-meat consumption to live and frozen imports moves going forward. Next, whether, in mountain areas like Tuyen Quang province, such a small-scale model grows into consolidated supply at the hamlet level. And whether Vietnam's goats and sheep, aiming at the halal market, the flow of moving toward one of the country's largest livestock operations in Khanh Hoa province will eventually connect with this grassroots in the north. First, try asking a regional trading house you deal with to confirm the live-goat market rate and shipping cycle once.

Sources

• Former party secretary farms Boer goats in Tuyen Quang, take-home of several hundred million dong a year (Trang Trai Viet / Dan Viet)
• Explanation of Boer breed characteristics (Tap chi Chan nuoi Viet Nam)
• Goat-meat value chain and restaurants' procurement structure (Nha Chan nuoi)
• Full text of Decree 178/2024 (Chinh phu)