'Collecting bang grass' wins SkyPixel aerial photo contest

The "Collecting bang grass", taken by Vietnamese lensman Nguyen Huu Binh, won the first prize in the Portrait category of SkyPixel 7th Anniversary Aerial Photo & Video Contest.

The photo depicts a farmer collecting bundles of bang grass (Lepironia articulata) crossing a water field. It was taken in December last year in My Hanh Bac commune, Duc Hoa district, the southern province of Long An.

Bang grass is the material to produce straws replacing plastic ones to protect the environment. The grass grows wild in most areas of the Mekong Delta and is known as an endowed material for people here to develop handicraft villages.

"My Hanh Bac is an alkaline soil, so farmers only can grow bang grass. In the afternoon sunlight, with an aerial view, the scene of a farmer pulling grass bundles across the green water field creates a vivid natural picture," Binh said.

In March, this photo has entered the last round of the Travel category of Sony World Photography Awards 2022.

Skypixel is a world famous contest of photos and videos taken with a remote control device (drone). The 7th contest in 2021, divided into four categories Nature, Architecture, Portrait and Sports, attracted nearly 30,000 entries from worldwide