Vegetable production in the Red River Delta of Vietnam. I. Opportunities and constraints

Abstract

An overview is given of the natural, socio-economic, agronomical and marketing conditions for vegetable production in the Red River Delta (RRD) of Vietnam. The seasonal variation in temperature in the RRD is the main determinant for the production season of vegetables. Heavy rainfall in the hot season increases production risks, as it may physically damage crops. Frequent rainfall in this period may enhance disease incidence. Landholdings are small and individual plots are the smallest of Indochina. Vegetables typically are produced in flooded rice based systems. Such systems are characterized by poor soil structure for vegetable production and high labour demand for the construction of raised beds. Highly perishable crops can only be grown close to the markets in the peri-urban areas. Less perishable crops can be produced further away from the city markets. Generally, large quantities of pesticides are used and there is increasing public concern about pesticide residues on products. The small landholdings, small plots and consequently the small amounts of product, limit effective marketing and make the producers dependent on collectors. Given the trends in population dynamics and human diets, urban vegetable demand in the RRD, however, has ample opportunities to grow.Effects have been analysed and categorised in opportunities and constraints for adopting improvements. A potential pathway to sustainable development is the development of permanent vegetable production systems, with producers co-operating in producers organizations, enabling them to work on a larger scale, produce larger volumes, introduce harvest date planning and quality control and aim for the integration of production with marketing in a vegetable value chain. By simultaneously adopting Good Agricultural Practices, consumers' food safety concerns can be addressed. The expected increase in vegetable demand is likely to open new opportunities for the RRD vegetable producers.

Value Chain Analysis of Vegetables on Urban Vietnam - Case of Danang City

“…Besides general characteristics mentioned above, agricultural product supply chain in Vietnam also has some distinctive attributes: (1) traditional market and small point of sale account for a great proportion of marketing channel (Huong et al, 2013;Tran et al, 2013) (2) Governance relations are limited due to the fragmented of smallsized producer and distributors (Wang et al, 2012;Tran et al, 2013). As a result, quality control still is a pressing problem of all relative supply chain participantes.…”

“…As a result, quality control still is a pressing problem of all relative supply chain participantes. There have been many researches proposing solutions in tackling this difficult situation (Wang et al, 2012) such as establish farmer associations (Moustier et al, 2010) or create professional agricultural producing consolidated groups or research institutes with the participation of individual farmers (Huong et al, 2013).…”

“…Until now, there are some reasons why agricultural producing and supplying in Vietnam still inefficiently and have to face with many difficulties: (1) The unstable weather condition, the poor techniques and methods, the lack of skilled workforce, high producing cost, the urbanization, the inablility in meeting the international food hygiene and safety requirement; (2) insufficiency inspection system; (3) unsustainability producing and the lack of collaboration between supply chain participants (Huong et al, 2013).…”

PermVeg: A Model to Design Crop Sequences for Permanent Vegetable Production Systems in the Red River Delta, Vietnam

“…In this design process, we first conducted a multidisciplinary analysis of current vegetable production in the RRD, covering climate, soils, socio‐economic, agronomic and marketing conditions (Huong et al. ). The development of permanent vegetable production systems came out as a potential pathway to sustainable development, with producers co‐operating in producer organizations and aiming for the integration of production with marketing in a vegetable value chain.…”

“…This model therefore is less suitable to design vegetable crop sequences for the RRD, where many vegetable crops are cultivated several times per year, in many different sequence configurations, without a certain closed rotation pattern (Huong et al. ,b).…”