An annual forum was held in Hanoi on November 25 seeking ways tosupport the development of the domestic food production market,improving product quality and safety and ensuring benefits for farmers.
This year’s forum, co-organised by the Ministry ofAgriculture and Rural Development (MARD) and the International SupportGroup (ISG) is themed “Market Development for Safe AgriculturalProducts”.
Speaking at the event, MARD DeputyMinister Nguyen Thi Xuan Thu said that although the safe vegetabletrademark and certification has been developed in several localities,this kind of product has not yet been widely consumed.
This shows the insufficiencies in the production and supply chain, aswell as problems with technical standards, she added.
Experts said Vietnam is still weak in production management, eventhough consumers’ demands on the quality of products are not high. Thereshould be better coordination and an improved legal framework tocontrol the safe vegetable production chain.
Vietnam can learn from several countries such as Japan, France and Ireland, they said.
According to the MARD Deputy Minister, Vietnam has recentlydeveloped some safe vegetable management projects with assistance fromDenmark, Canada and Japan. However maintaining the projectsonce they are complete will be difficult due to a lack of finance.
Thu called for more international support in building a sustainable safe agricultural production chain.
Statistics from MARD’s Department of Processing and Trade forAgro-Forestry-Fisheries Products and Salt Production show that Vietnamis now devoting over 823,000 hectares of land to grow vegetables,which creates an output of 14 million tonnes of products per year, 85percent of which are for domestic consumption.
Despite having a large diversity of vegetables, the area set aside forsafe vegetable production in Vietnam is still limited. As of early2013, there were only 71,728 hectares of land zoned off for safevegetable production and of these, only 6,800 ha have been certified asmeeting safe production standards, including various kinds of GAP(Good Agricultural Practice) standards.-VNA
This year’s forum, co-organised by the Ministry ofAgriculture and Rural Development (MARD) and the International SupportGroup (ISG) is themed “Market Development for Safe AgriculturalProducts”.
Speaking at the event, MARD DeputyMinister Nguyen Thi Xuan Thu said that although the safe vegetabletrademark and certification has been developed in several localities,this kind of product has not yet been widely consumed.
This shows the insufficiencies in the production and supply chain, aswell as problems with technical standards, she added.
Experts said Vietnam is still weak in production management, eventhough consumers’ demands on the quality of products are not high. Thereshould be better coordination and an improved legal framework tocontrol the safe vegetable production chain.
Vietnam can learn from several countries such as Japan, France and Ireland, they said.
According to the MARD Deputy Minister, Vietnam has recentlydeveloped some safe vegetable management projects with assistance fromDenmark, Canada and Japan. However maintaining the projectsonce they are complete will be difficult due to a lack of finance.
Thu called for more international support in building a sustainable safe agricultural production chain.
Statistics from MARD’s Department of Processing and Trade forAgro-Forestry-Fisheries Products and Salt Production show that Vietnamis now devoting over 823,000 hectares of land to grow vegetables,which creates an output of 14 million tonnes of products per year, 85percent of which are for domestic consumption.
Despite having a large diversity of vegetables, the area set aside forsafe vegetable production in Vietnam is still limited. As of early2013, there were only 71,728 hectares of land zoned off for safevegetable production and of these, only 6,800 ha have been certified asmeeting safe production standards, including various kinds of GAP(Good Agricultural Practice) standards.-VNA
