Vietnam Agriculture - Weekly Summary (20 - 25 August 2018)

Nieuwsbericht | 27-08-2018 | 11:57

A weekly summary of agriculture development and production in Vietnam by VietLinh online.

Aquaculture:

On August 22, the Vietnam Association of Seafood Exporters and Producers (VASEP) inaugurated the 20th Viet Nam Fisheries International Exhibition Fair (VIETFISH), which was held at the Sai Gon Exhibition Center until August 24. This year, VIETFISH welcomed 233 units from 14 countries and territories with 374 exhibition booths, an increase of 3.6% compared to 2017.

Particularly, this year, there were 153 participants from Vietnam, equivalent to 66% of the total participants. The number of exhibitors in aquaculture, aquaculture and services accounted for 55%, whereas the remaining booths were mainly for introductions of machinery, equipment, chemicals, additives, or cold storage.

In the framework of the exhibition, the General Department of Fisheries, VASEP, the Vietnam Fisheries Society, and IDH - The Sustainable Trade Initiative jointly signed an agreement to co-operate the project "Supporting Sustainable Aquaculture Development in Mekong Delta Through Public-Private Partnerships." The purpose of this project was to aiming for a long-term growth of the Vietnamese fisheries sector.

Processing, Import and Export:

According to the General Department of Fisheries, by the end of July 2018, provinces in Mekong Delta had more than 4,033 hectares of commercial tra fish (pangasius), which was by 106% of the same period in 2017. The harvest area of tra fish in this region was 2,335 hectares, bringing a volume of 814,086 tons.

Businesses exported tra fish also earned $1.2 billion, which was an increase of 19.3% over the same period in 2017. China, the United States and the EU continued to be major importer of tra fish.

Tra fish export still encountered many difficulties such as anti-dumping lawsuits, or negative image in the EU. Some import markets are demanding stricter quality standards. Therefore, businesses need to have solutions to maintain their productions, product quality, and the brand name “tra fish from Vietnam.”

Livestock:

Evacuating buffaloes to safe places during flood seasons is familiar to the people in Southwestern region of Vietnam. This year, farmers continue to evacuate their animals during the flood season.

As the flood level rises in the last 3 months, all over the place, land is submerged in turbid water in Southwestern areas. There is no grass for buffaloes to eat. Thus, people usually will ride their buffaloes to high, harvested rice paddy fields for them to eat grass. After that, they continue to evacuate them to other fields to find food. Until the end of the flood season, farmers bring their buffaloes back home and feed them dry straw.

Due to the reducing obstinacy compared to previous years, there are no more situtations where thousands of buffaloes are evacuated. This year, only about more than 100 buffaloes are ridden to a field in Hong Ngu District (Dong Thap Province).

Plantation:

Vietnam is the seventh largest tea producer with the fifth largest yield of exported tea in the world. The country has 124,000 hectares of tea, about 500 tea processing establishments, and a production capacity of more than 500,000 tons of dried tea per year.

Despite that, Vietnamese tea is mainly exported to “easy” markets. A very few number of tea products meet the standards for import to “difficult” markets requiring high quality such as the EU or the U.S.

According to the Vietnam Tea Association, compared with other countries in the region, Vietnamese tea has the lowest export price, only equal to 60-70% of the world’s average tea price. The cause of this situation is that the country’s farming and processing procedures did not comply with standards, ensure food safety and high quality of the tea.

Fruits:

Hoang Anh Gia Lai Agricultural Joint Stock Company (HAGL Agirco) has recently approved a plan to change its fruit tree area. The firm will use funding from its recent public offering of convertible bonds.

HAGL Agirco will plant an addition of 5.007 hectares of bananas. With a total investment of VND976 billion, the estimated investment value per hectare is about VND195 million.

The company sets a target to record VND1,745 billion in revenue this year from harvesting and consuming 106,200 tons of bananas. The fruit is expected to contribute more than VND983 billion of gross profit, accounting for nearly 59% of the structure of profit by product of the company.

Farmers, Agriculture, Countryside:

In 2015, at the age of 33, Tyna Giang, a French-Vietnamese, left France for Vietnam to invest in organic agriculture. She chose the Central Highlands as the starting point because of its pristine environment to set up Biophap. The first step of the company successfully built five farming models in the Central Highlands in a total area of over 50 hectares. The farms plant 120 organic species certified by standards from the USDA (the U.S.), JAS (Japan), AB (European Union), and Fair for Life by Ecocert, an organic certification organization from France.

Typha Giang's agro-forestry organic farming model is the first project in Vietnam to reach the highest rank in the "100 projects against climate change" competition organized by the French Ministry of Environment, Energy and Sea in 2016. In mid-February, Biophap is one of the seven companies of the Vietnam Organic Agriculture Association (VOAA) to participate in the world's leading trade fair for organic food held in Germany, Biofach.

Pet, Flowers and Ornamental Plants:

Phung Cong Commune, Van Giang District, Hung Yen Province has 1,700 households. Among them, there are 1,200 households planting flowers and ornamental trees in an area of nearly 100 hectares. They bring an economic value of VND550 million/hectare/year. The average income of people in the commune is over VND60 million/person/year. With high-tech farming, some of them even earn higher income of VND1.5 - 2 billion/year

Also growing flowers and ornamental plants such as residents in Phung Cong Commune, people in Xuan Quan Commune have found their own directions by focusing on rare flowers such as ancient roses or new imported species. Thus, local households can earn about VND70 million/hectare/year on average. Specifically, nearly 900 flower growers in this area have an average income of VND300 million or more each year. Many households can earn up to VND2 to 4 billion VND per year from floriculture.