Hanoi’s agriculture aims for sustainable export

Hanoi has made important strides in marketing agricultural products by ensuring that growing areas meet quality standards and food safety and aim for sustainable export, according to Vu Thi Huong, director of the Hanoi Agricultural Extension Center.

Huong stressed that Hanoi is focusing on developing areas that meet quality standards and have growing codes to trace the origin of the product, meet growing demand from export markets, and expand the production of local agricultural specialties.

"The city has more than 13,000 production and processing enterprises in agriculture, forestry and fisheries. Hanoi's agricultural sector has also been granted 16 codes for fruit growing areas," Huong told The Hanoi Times.

Vu Thi Huong (first right), director of the Hanoi Agricultural Extension Center, visits Soc Son District's organic vegetable production model. Photo: Hanoi Agricultural Extension Center

She added that some of Hanoi's agricultural products are of high quality and have been exported to other countries, especially Dai Thanh longan to the US, Dong Phu organic rice to Germany, Van Duc vegetables to South Korea, and bananas to China.

Nguyen Van Minh, director of Van Duc Agricultural Service Business Cooperative in Hanoi's Gia Lam District, said that Van Duc Commune currently has 220 hectares of safe vegetables. Among them, 26.9 hectares have been produced according to VietGAP (Good Agricultural Practices).

"The cooperative has supplied safe vegetables to supermarkets, wholesale markets, and neighboring provinces and also exports 300-500 tons of safe vegetables annually to Taiwan (China) and South Korea," Minh added.

Impressive achievements

According to Ta Van Tuong, deputy director of the city's Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, Hanoi has achieved exports of agricultural and forestry products worth more than US$1.3 trillion in the first nine months of 2023. Among them, agricultural and food products accounted for US$777 million, an increase of 22.9% year-on-year.

Hanoi has also closely coordinated with 43 other provinces and cities to support 926 safe food supply chains, connecting the city's export enterprises with production chains in other localities, Tuong said.

He noted that although Hanoi has made positive progress in boosting agricultural exports, many difficulties remain, including a lack of investment in product production and processing in the city. "Mechanisms and policies to attract investment in agricultural production are not strong enough to attract businesses, especially in processing agricultural products," Tuong added.

The deputy director suggested specific solutions to help businesses and cooperatives expand export markets, including training on quality assurance and inspection of imported and exported food products.

"Hanoi is also communicating among exporters about trade agreements and import conditions of other countries. Strengthening connectivity and trade promotion activities in foreign markets is also an important component of the city's agricultural export strategy," he stressed.

Hanoi's exporters face difficulties to accessing materials that meet international standards, especially from markets with high requirements such as organic standards, GlobalGAP, and ISO 22000.

Tran Van Hieu, Director of Agricultural Development and Environmental Consulting Limited Company, urged to link enterprises and communities in Hanoi and other provinces and cities to export successfully. At the same time, it is necessary to invest in high technology to create safe agricultural products and ensure food safety in line with the requirements of destination markets.