Villagers’ quarrels may be as common as the sun rising and setting each day, but it’s more rare that a disagreement between inhabitants of a village would directly impair their lifeblood trade.
Such is the case with a village of bronze casters in central Quang Nam Province, where debates over the founding father of the trade have fostered disunity and conflicts, and prevented skilled artisans from cooperating with one another to promote their unique products widely.
Phuoc Kieu Village in Dien Ban District’s Dien Phuong Commune is home to 12 clans, each of whom has laid claim to be the originator of the famous trade in the locality.
Duong Ngoc Sang, a village elder, said a man named Duong Ngoc Chuc from the Duong clan was the first to introduce the trade to the village about 400 years ago.
“Elder casters from other clans are just Mr. Chuc’s students,” Sang claimed.
As the largest clan in the village with the greatest number of skilled bronze casters, the argument posited by members of the clan has dominated the village’s discourse.
But individuals from other clans such as Nguyen Ba, Tran or Pham vehemently disagree.
However, the 12 clans have lost all historical documents and records to floods in the past and thus can only berate one another in an effort to elevate their ancestors as the trade’s forefather.
Such quarrels are heard yearly at the ceremony to worship the ancestors of the 12 clans, which is organized at a common temple in the village.
“Any meeting involving the whole village always raises a cacophony of problems because villagers rarely cooperate for the common good,” said Duong Ngoc Truyen, an expert local bronze caster.
The arguments are not simply a matter of relational negotiations, but they have served to undermine the village’s bronze casting trade.
Local casters said since no clan wants to be subordinate to another clan, artisans in the village cannot reach a common plan to develop the local traditional trade.
Everyone, hence, launches his own independent production and there’s no fund pool to support or sustain a long-lasting scheme for plying the trade, locals said, adding that those without money would soon go out of business.
“Sometimes I have a lucrative purchase offer [for bronze goods] but I have to turn it down because I don’t have enough funds to buy raw materials,” said Nguyen Manh, a bronze factory owner native to the village.
“Material costs account for 70 percent of product retail prices, so we are handicapped if we have no capital to buy the materials.”
He also stressed that traditional methods of production are costly and make local products uncompetitive compared to ones produced in urban hubs that employ better production technologies.
In the vicinity of the village, many shops sell bronze goods branded as Phuoc Kieu products, but they actually have been bought from Ho Chi Minh City.
“The local bronze trade is dying out,” said expert artisan Duong Nhi.
Most households in the village have abandoned the trade, with only about a few dozens still holding on.
The three biggest bronze casting plants in the village are only in operation four to five months a year at most.
As the trade is unstable and not well-paid, many young locals have left for the central Da Nang City to work for construction sites.
“There’s a dire lack of skilled young casters,” said village elder Sang.
Business difficulties have also led to unhealthy competition as local casters vie by any means necessary to gain customers.
“They lower prices by using low quality materials,” bronze factory owner Duong Ngoc Truyen said, giving an example of how by, reducing a little amount of tin, a bronze caster can save money but the sound of the product won’t be as beautiful.
“Then the village loses its reputation,” he said.
“If villagers remain uncooperative, there’s no way the bronze casting trade will survive for long.”
Source: Tuoi Tre |
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