Viet Reader.

VR.

Premier Newspaper for Vietnamese Worldwide

Lam Dong Province works towards modern agriculture

 

Lam Dong leaders visit a high-tech strawberry farm in Lac Duong District.   

NDO - The Central Highlands province of Lam Dong is a pioneer in developing high-tech agriculture, focusing on both smart agriculture and organic agriculture. With the production breakthroughs of recent years, agriculture has become a key economic sector of Lam Dong.


Nhan Dan had an interview with Lam Dong Party Secretary Tran Duc Quan on this orientation.

Q: What is Lam Dong doing in order to realise the goal of a comprehensive, sustainable and modern agriculture?

A: Lam Dong Province possesses many comparative advantages of climate and soil for agricultural development, so the province has identified agriculture as a key economic sector, in which high-tech agriculture is one of its priorities. For years, the province has tapped into its advantages to create many well-known agricultural brands in both Vietnam and the world, causing its agricultural products to gradually penetrate deeper into the global value chain. The results achieved in recent years have affirmed that developing high-tech agriculture is a right policy.

Over the next five years, Lam Dong will continue to push through agricultural restructuring towards a modern and smart agriculture so that the province will be a national and international agricultural research and production centre.

With that in mind, Lam Dong has introduced many synchronous policies and mechanisms to promote agriculture and rural development, such as supporting large-scale agricultural production, providing technical assistance, encouraging scientific research, mechanisation and shift to high-yield crops and husbandry, promoting cooperation in agriculture as well as trade promotion and brand development. Lam Dong is also working to enhance credit access for farmers and enterprises, giving priority to high-tech agriculture projects and supporting start-up projects.

Q: What has Lam Dong done to deal with such challenges as management capacity, human resources, and intellectual property in developing high-tech agriculture?

A: Lam Dong has created an agriculture with a relatively high level of production, well-known brands and high productivity. The province’s agricultural value is approximately VND191 million (US$8,400) per hectare a year, nearly double the national average, and labour productivity is VND62 million (US$2,700) per year, equivalent to 1.17 times the national average.

The province currently has 61,159 hectares of high-tech agriculture, accounting for one fifth of the total cultivation land area, with many models achieving annual revenue of over VND3 billion (US$131,900) per hectare. Lam Dong also has 13 enterprises recognised as high-tech agricultural enterprises, 90 cooperatives and farms employing IoT and organic farming, and 175 linkage chains with the participation of 201 enterprises and cooperatives and 17,000 farming households. They are the important foundation to enhance the position of Lam Dong’s agriculture, meeting the requirements of integration and participation in the global value chain.

During the implementation, the province has always pointed out the drawbacks, their causes, and worked out the solutions. With regards to human resources development, expertise and management capacity are frequently enhanced through training classes to keep the province updated with the latest development trends. Farmers and owners of enterprises and cooperatives have opportunities to increase their capacity through training courses, seminars with experts, and visits to countries with modern agriculture such as Japan, the Netherlands and Israel. Such trips have broadened the farming vision and mindset.

Concerning intellectual property, Lam Dong has proactively created brands and filed for, established intellectual property rights for 28 specific products, supported brand registration and protection for 1,500 units.

We also have specific solutions for other issues such as conversion of land use purpose, high-quality human resources training, funding, plant variety rights, linkage chains, logistics, market cooperation, and development to deal with the bottlenecks.

Q: High-tech agriculture produces high yields so even greater focus must be given to consumption. What are the specific policies to help farmers sell their products and expand the market?

A: Lam Dong’s agricultural produce has been known for a long time, which is a favourable condition for market development. To meet the market’s stringent demand, enterprises, cooperatives and farmers have been instructed to proactively follow the standards of each commodity to enhance competitiveness. The province has also worked to support the formation of linkage chains from field to market, organise trade promotion activities, promote products through multiple channels, such as e-commerce platforms.

Lam Dong’s agriculture is developing towards large-scale farming, creating the products that meet international standards to enhance competitiveness and target high-end export markets. With that in mind, we have successfully built geographical indications to open the way for local products to conquer the domestic and international markets.

Lam Dong’s agricultural goods are currently exporting to more than 40 countries and territories, including demanding markets such as those of Japan, Europe and the United States.

Q: Some other provinces are also now giving priority to high-tech agriculture development. How will Lam Dong’s leading position in this field will be defended?

A: We do not place emphasis on the leading position. When Lam Dong’s agriculture is modernised and new-generation farmers can become rich from agriculture, then the province’s agricultural position will be naturally strengthened.

With that in mind, we follow the motto that enterprises are the core, farmers are the centre, employing science and technology is the prerequisite, building linkage is for sustainable development, and building brands is to protect producers and create confidence for consumers.

Lam Dong is implementing concreate measures to develop a comprehensive and modern agriculture, as well as taking bold administrative reform so that enterprises will have a favourable business climate. To ensure sustainable development, we have paid attention to using natural resources in a reasonable way, protect the environment and adapt to climate change.

Thank you very much.


Mai Van Bao, Dong Ha/Translated by NDO

About author
You should write because you love the shape of stories and sentences and the creation of different words on a page.
View all posts
More on this story