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Coffee industry confers on growth path
Industry professionals offered solutions to the challenges faced by the Vietnamese coffee industry like poor quality, low competitiveness, inadequate distribution, and others at a conference held Sunday as part of the third annual coffee festival being held in Buon Ma Thuot.
The coffee industry needs bank loans at soft rates for its sustainable development, Luong Van Tu, Chairman of the Vietnam Coffee and Cocoa Association, said.
This will fund the replanting of coffee plants that are old or damaged by pests which annually account for 30 percent of the total planted area, he said.
It can also be used to expand the area under the arabica variety of coffee which normally fetches up to 2.5 times the value of robusta, he added.
Branding and diversifying are keys to the industry’s growth, several delegates said.
The government needs to assist the coffee sector in tailoring its market strategies, standards, and technical requirements to global benchmarks, some said.
There should also be focus on electronic trading to strengthen Vietnam’s position in the global coffee market, others said.
Skilled workers are needed to bolster the growth of the industry, they said.
Vietnam is the world’s biggest exporter of robusta coffee with an annual production of around 1 million tons.
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