"Digital journey" of lychees: From orchards to dinning-tables

Hanoi (VNA) - According to a report by the Bac Giang People's Committee, the northern province has 28,100 hectares of "thieu" lychee cultivation in the 2021 crop, with total output estimated at 180,000 tonnes, an increase of 15,000 tonnes from 2020. The local main harvest season this year lasts from June 10 to July 20.

In recent days, lychees have been put on sale on e-commerce platforms to quickly reach consumers nationwide, helping ease farmer’s concern over unsold products given complicated developments of the pandemic.

Lychees available on six e-commerce platforms

On June 2, the Vietnam E-Commerce and Digital Economy Agency under the Ministry of Industry and Trade said that it has successfully cooperated with six major platforms in Vietnam to put lychees on sale. Accordingly, the concerned parties have also agreed on plans for purchase, logistics, and e-commerce.

The six platforms consist of Sen do (run by FPT), Vo So (Viettel Post), Postmart (VNpost), Tiki, Shopee, and Cuccu.

Currently, the platforms are preparing goods, transport and preservation options for a large-scale sale of lychees from Bac Giang.

At the end of May, under the direction of the Ministry of Information and Communications and the Ministry of Industry and Trade, fresh Bac Giang lychees were put on sale on the Vo So e-commerce platform. As of June 3, the number of Bac Giang farmers selling their lychees on the site were 96. They sealed a total of 23,813 orders for 148.5 tonnes of lychees.

Viettel Post has set a plan for lychees to reach their buyers nationwide within six and 48 hours after being harvested.

Tran Trung Hung, General Director of Viettel Post, said that the company will organise a multi-point and continuous truck system from Bac Giang to other provinces and cities across the nation. Its refrigerated vehicles are ultilised at maximum capacity to transport the fruit, especially large batches to the central and southern regions will be transported by air, according to Hung.

In addition, Viettel Post has completed the paperwork to export lychees from Bac Giang to Germany.

Meanwhile, Sendo has announced its goal of finding outlets for 100 tonnes of Bac Giang lychees via a programme held on the platform from June 6 to 10.

Vietnam Post has just cooperated with the Ministry of Industry and Trade’s Market Surveillance Agency to organise a nationwide drive to encourage the consumption of the lychees, with a committed output amounting to 3,000 tonnes.

According to Postmart, the amount of Bac Giang lychees transacted on the site since late May has exceeded 291.5 tonnes to date. The number of orders for the product during the period was 19.865 worth 8.52 billion VND.

Accompanying farmers from the first steps

Putting local products on an e-commerce trading floor is not easy because the capacity of cooperatives and farmers remain limited.

According to Phan Trong Le, head of Vietnam Post’s brand research and development department, said there is a lack of human resources with knowledge of information technology, especially skills in consulting, customer care or assessing consumer trends, which are still quite unfamiliar to farmers.

Moreover, preserving agricultural products is also a problem because farmers used to only sell to traders, he added.

According to Le, Vietnam Post has so far helped cooperatives and farmers in goods transport and online stall establishment, while running discount programmes to stimulate demand for Vietnamese farm produce.

Sendo has also taken similar measures to assist farmers to quickly assess e-commerce platforms.

During the "digital journey" of lychees from orchards to dinning-tables, e-commerce platforms are present to ensure benefits for both sides.

More importantly, the purchase and sale of fresh agricultural products on these platforms will be a new direction in the future, changing the habit of domestic consumers.

The National Digital Transformation Programme has selected agriculture as one of eight priority areas for digital transformation. For such target, changing the traditional sale mindset as well as helping farmers get used to using digital technology are necessary./.