At the seminar in Hanoi on August 17 (Photo: VNA)
Hanoi (VNA) – A delegation of Danish enterprises operating in the agricultural and food fields are paying a working visit to Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City from August 16-19 to seek cooperation and business opportunities with potential local partners.
The trip was part of the efforts of the Danish Embassy in Hanoi, the Vietnamese Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development and the Danish Agriculture & Food Council to restore long-term cooperative ties in the fields of agriculture and food between the two nations after a two-year hiatus due to impacts from the COVID-19 pandemic.
The delegation comprises 13 leading companies operating in livestock breeding, food production, foodstuff and material processing technology, and temperature regulating solutions. These are essential sectors helping to develop agricultural and food production towards higher efficiency and sustainability.
The visit aims to share experience and introduce Denmark's certified world-leading solutions in agricultural and food production and seek opportunities for cooperation with Vietnamese partners.
On this occasion, the Danish Embassy in Hanoi, the Vietnamese Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, the Danish Veterinary and Food Administration and the Danish Agriculture & Food Council co-organised seminars entitled "Danish experiences and solutions in sustainable agri-food production" in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City on August 17 and 18, respectively.
The seminars created a forum to connect and share experiences, knowledge and technologies among policymakers, managers and businesspeople of Denmark and Vietnam. The events were followed by meetings and working sessions between Vietnamese and Danish enterprises.
About 135 Danish firms have opened branch offices in Vietnam so far and they are actively contributing to the growth of various sectors, including agriculture, Vietnamese Deputy Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development Phung Duc Tien said at the seminar in Hanoi on August 17.
Tien underscored Denmark as one of the leading countries in agriculture and sustainable development. Denmark's experiences, he believed, would help Vietnamese firms speed up on the road to high-tech and climate-smart agriculture.
Sanne Hoj Andren, Sector Counsellor for Agri-Food at the Embassy of Denmark, revealed that strategic sector cooperation (SSC) is a partnership between Danish public authorities and Vietnamese ministries.
The two countries have SSC in four areas: education, health, food safety and statistics. The overall objective of the food safety SSC is to improve feed quality and food safety in Vietnam's pork value chain.
To that end, Danish authorities have assisted Vietnamese partners in pork origin tracing, controlling veterinary medicines, food safety in meat processing, and capacity building in risk-based management.
Dinh Pham Hien, PSAV Secretariat at the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development's International Cooperation Department, said that the Partnership for Sustainable Agriculture (PAS) was a World Economic Forum initiative to promote sustainable agriculture worldwide.
Vietnam institutionalised working groups into PAS in 2015, and the Partnership for Sustainable Agriculture in Vietnam (PASV) was tasked with bringing together players in the agricultural sector to establish value chains of Vietnamese produce.
The PASV has increased farming productivity by 17% and farmer incomes while cutting CO2 emissions by 43%. The initiative has also helped value chains meet international standards.
Jeppe Sondergaard Pedersen, International Chief Adviser of the Danish Agriculture and Food Council, said Denmark had 4,121 organic farms that cultivated 310,000 ha of land in 2020.
Given so much land claimed by cultivation, the country has to become more sustainable by embracing circular production and resource-efficient approaches. Its produce remains competitive through higher yields, increased efficiency, added value, and entrance to new markets.
Troels Vensild, Head of the Danish Veterinary and Food Administration's International Cooperation Division, underscored Denmark as among the world's most sustainable food producers.
Green transition is key for Danish firms to export sustainable products, resource-efficient solutions and technologies globally./.
