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Exporting dragon fruit requires teamwork
Farmers in Binh Thuan province who grow thanh long (blue dragon fruit), cannot find outlets for their products. Meanwhile, export companies complain that they cannot arrange enough blue dragon fruit to complete big orders.
Ly Hai Long, Export Director of HCM City-based Bao Thanh Company Ltd, specialising in exporting fruit, said that a lot of orders are coming in from Europe, but he cannot purchase clean blue dragon in Binh Thuan province to fulfill the export orders.
According to Long, foreign distributors, supermart groups do not place small orders: they always want big supplies for the whole year. Metro group, for example, wants 600 tonnes of blue dragon fruit for 2008.
Vietnamese enterprises are absolutely capable of meeting the big orders – if they join forces with each other. However, enterprises do not cooperate with each other, which means that big volume export contracts are beyond their grasp. Owners of big blue dragon fruit farms do not want to cooperate with big export companies which have experience and a lot of capital because they think that the export companies will earn big money from the blue dragon they grow.
Long stressed that if Vietnam does not sell blue dragons directly to foreign supermart groups, it will have to sell through intermediaries. This means that the value of Vietnam’s blue dragon will decrease by 40%.
The director of another fruit export company in HCM City said that the lack of cooperation among Vietnamese companies has reduced the competitiveness of Vietnam’s blue dragon fruit in export markets.
The director related that his company once exported blue dragon fruit to Germany at $30/4kg box. After that, other blue dragon companies in Binh Thuan offered to export blue dragon at $24/4kg only. It is clear that Vietnamese companies are creating difficulties for each other. As a result, enterprises cannot purchase blue dragon from farmers at high prices.
Long said that it is necessary to set up a joint-stock company responsible for the distribution of Binh Thuan blue dragon fruit. Farmers would be able to make capital contributions to the company and profit from blue dragon exports would be divided among the company’s members. He said that Bao Thanh will send representatives to discuss the establishment of the company.
Long complains that security checks at airports have also been putting difficulties on fresh fruit exporters. When packing fruits for export, enterprises put fruit in frozen (less than minus 10oC) containers. However, customs officers at airports always ask for the containers to be opened and the blue dragon boxes put through a scanner, which affects their quality. Meanwhile, in other countries, customs officers can examine the entire container once without removing the fruit.
Long said that every year, Bao Thanh has to spend some $300,000 in compensation for boxes of spoiled fruit due to this procedure.
VNN
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