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Vietnam must promote rice brand names abroad
Despite being one of the world’s biggest rice exporters, Vietnam has failed to promote its brand names, said Le Van Banh, Director of the Mekong Delta River Research Institute.
Although Vietnam had a large variety of rice seeds, including specialities, they were not well publicized abroad, he said.
Behind the failure was the loose co-operation among four relevant partners in rice production: the State, the farmer, the enterprise and the scientist, he said.
The rice researcher said co-operation between the enterprise and the farmer was the most important. Businesses were responsible for finding a market for the farmer and building up a good reputation.
Banh also blamed scientists for failing to make accurate forecasts about rice demand across the world and advance post-harvest technology to promote Vietnamese brand names.
Another reason Banh cited was related to food security for the country.
“Just compare Vietnam and Thailand, which has 10 million hectares of rice land with a population of more than 60 million, we can see a part of the problem,” he said. “Meanwhile, Vietnam just has nearly 4 million hectares of rice field to feed more than 86 million people.”
Thailand focuses on growing good-quality rice varieties, with a long maturing period, which can produce 1-3 tonnes per hectare. Vietnam plants lower-quality varieties with a much shorter maturing period, which can produce 6-8 tonnes per hectare.
Prof Vo Tong Xuan, Former Rector of An Giang University, also spoke of the low quality of Vietnamese rice for export.
“Companies and traders often buy rice directly from farmers with different kinds of rice grains mixed together,” Xuan said. “With such a buying method, they cannot ensure the homogeneity of the rice, and so the quality is low.”
To create a brand name for Vietnamese rice, export companies should be allowed to decide the selling market for themselves, he emphasised urging policy-makers to draw up legislation on this issue for co-operatives or collective groups of farmers.
vietnamnet, vov
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