Pham Van Thanh returned home in 1979 with a desire to do something for his family and his homeland after serving his duty in the army for many years. He faced a lot of difficulties in settling down. Realizing his town was home to coconut trees, Mr Thanh started to think of making use of coconuts. While local people only used coconut stems to make brooms, he wondered about making baskets from this material. With this in mind, Mr Thanh began making flower and fruit baskets from coconut stems.

After numerous efforts, Mr Thanh succeeded in making the first flower basket from coconut stem, which was quite different from those made from rattan or bamboo. They were such a success that Mr Thanh began making products from coconuts on a larger scale.

In 1993, a Taiwanese customer met him and wanted to cooperate with him in producing coconut products. From that moment, he diversified his coconut products from baskets to chopsticks, tea-pots, toys and decorations.

With a good supply of materials, including coconut trunks, leaves, dippers, and barks, artisan Pham Van Thanh has created a wide range of products with different shapes and meaning.

Every day, his establishment produces hundreds of products, 70 percent of which is for export. To date, his business has more than 500 items for export which earns him an annual turnover of more than VND3 billion. He helps generate regular jobs for more than 200 local people with an average salary of VND1.5 million per person per month.

Not only a veteran in producing coconut products, artisan Thanh is also a devoted teacher who is willing to share his expertise with workers in the hope that they will make high-quality products.

Nguyen Van Cuong, a worker at his establishment, says he earns enough to live comfortesly by working for Mr Thanh. Mr Thanh is a nice boss and a good teacher too, Mr Cuong says.

Succeeding in producing products from coconuts, artisan Pham Van Thanh has actively taken part in charitable activities. He is now a member of the Old Age Association and the War Veteran Association.

With his great contribution and innovation, Pham Van Thanh and his establishment recently had the honour of receiving former Party general secretary Do Muoi and former Prime Minister Vo Van Kiet. He represented Ben Tre province at the first national congress of excellent old-age producers in Hanoi in 2003.

Many of artisan Thanh’s products received the “Most favoured product” awards by the Japanese International Cooperation Agency (JICA) and a certificate of merit from the Vietnamese Prime Minister.