Experts: technology road map urgent for Vietnam’s rice

A farmer uses a rice-cultivating machine to plant rice. (Source: foodsecurity.dupont.com)

Hanoi (VNA) – A road map is necessary for applying technologies to rice production in order to enhance Vietnam’s rice competitiveness to meet the increasingly high demand of the market, according to rice experts.

Speaking at a conference on technology application in rice production in Hanoi on June 10, Deputy Minister of Science and Technology Tran Van Tung said in the face of fiercer competition and increasingly complicated climate change, the agricultural sector in general and rice production in particular need a strategy for technological innovation and development meeting the sector’s shift towards increasing added value.

Ta Viet Dung, Head of Department for Technology Application, said the road map for the application of technology will help enterprises have a clearer look at their capability in comparison with competitors. It will also allow them to identify opportunities to be brought about by investment in technology and decide how to make the investment.

Hoang Van Phong, Chairman of the National Science and Technology Policy Council, said the development of a technological map is a correct approach to have a comprehensive and objective assessment of the current technological capability.

Rice production is among key fields targeted by the national technological innovation programme until 2020, which aims to build the process and method of building a technological map and a road map for technological innovation in selected sectors.-VNA