Towards Sustainable Development of Tropical Fruits Sector in Vietnam

The United Nations Industrial Development Organisation (UNIDO) in collaboration with the Agro Processing and Trade Development Authority of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development organized a virtual expert group workshop “Towards a Theory of Change for Development of Tropical Fruits sector in Vietnam” on 8 September 2020. The aim of the workshop is to reach a common understanding of development opportunities and necessary transformations need for the mango and tropical fruits sector in Vietnam, and to identify key conditions for achieving such transformations' objectives.

The workshop drew the participation of senior experts from different governmental agencies, private sectors, associations, research institutes, finance institutions, and development partners.

Mr. Le Thanh Hoa, Deputy Director of Agro-Trade, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development shared the workshop: “In South East Asia, Vietnam ranks third among 5 main fruits and vegetable exporters, after the Philippines and Thailand. The country’s fruits turnover was nearly USD 3 billion in 2019, an increase of 46% compared to that of 2016. Vietnam plans to become in the top 5 world fruit exporters by 2030. Therefore, we highly appreciate the experts’ valuable inputs at the workshop.”

The expert group workshop was facilitated under the framework of the on-going Vietnam Project entitled “Increase quality and standards compliance capacity of mango value chain in Mekong River Delta”, a component of the Global Quality and Standards Programme which is funded by the Swiss State Secretariat for Economic Affairs (SECO).

Addressing the workshop Mr. Jonas Grunder, Deputy Head of Cooperation, Swiss State Secretariat for Economic Affairs (SECO) said: “The key challenges for fruit exporters from Vietnam, particularly small and medium-sized enterprises (SME) are to comply with market entry requirements/standards, technical regulations and market requirements.  SECO believes that the Project will be a good showcase for policy making and also for replication as a good business model in agriculture sector.”

Ms. Le Thi Thanh Thao, Country Representative of UNIDO in Vietnam highlighted: “One of UNIDO’s core areas of intervention aims to promote sustainable, inclusive business opportunities through agri-business and agro-value chain development. UNIDO provides technical assistance to add value to agricultural production by strengthening linkages between agricultural production, manufacturing and market. UNIDO supports the improvement of the competitive supply capacities of developing countries, and enable their enterprises to meet international market requirements, including quality, safety, and social and environment-related standards and promote responsible business practices.”

The expert group will continue to play as a platform for the joint efforts from different stakeholders to contribute to the development the fruit sector in Vietnam in the future.