Hi-tech agriculture to be a spearhead economic sector

The southern economic hub of Ho Chi Minh City has already implemented a hi-tech agricultural model, proving how effective such models can be.

This Ho Chi Minh City Agricultural Hi-Tech Park’s Centre for High Technology Agricultural Business Incubation. All kinds of support in terms of advanced technology are offered here. One of them is to encourage cultivation in net houses. Besides having space to farm, enterprises received help regarding the choice of crops, farming techniques and marketing.

High Tech solutions here actually means three things. First is the drip irrigation system that uses Israeli technology. That can save water. Secondly our farming practice here doesn’t use soil, which can prevent contamination. Thirdly, cultivation in these net houses means we can grow crops throughout the year as they don’t rely on weather conditions. Output is therefore increased.

Research and Development is also very important in hi-tech agriculture. Within this park, a lab was built to research, test and provide good crops which can yield sustainable output.

This lab is well-equipped, from a sterile room to precision machinery, for researching and creating high-quality crops. A new crop is transplanted to a clean environment in a glass bottle, and stored at the microorganism manipulation room.

For growing plant cells and tissues and micro biotechnology, we have created a foundation for incubated businesses to utilise. Many have proven successful in growing and creating new types of crops. Two enterprises have so far used this micro biotechnology to make high added value products.

Net houses and special research labs are just two examples of facilities that the park has to boost hi-tech agriculture. A business incubation programme was also scheduled to help nurture enterprises like Mong Ngoc’s Viet Mushrooms. Applying technological solutions to mushroom production has proved quite successful.

The centre’s business incubation programme has helped me a lot in producing, maintaining and hybridising mushroom spawn. They taught us modern growing techniques. The centre also provided us with equipment and machinery to facilitate production. And more importantly, they assisted in the distribution of the end products. ​

The Ho Chi Minh City Agricultural Hi-Tech Park is now currently one of 17 hi-tech agricultural zones and biotechnology centres nationwide.

The prime minister also approved a master plan for agriculture towards 2020 with a vision to 2030 in May, aiming to put into use 10 more hi-tech agricultural zones in several localities nationwide.

With several free trade agreements just been signed, the Trans-Pacific Partnership’s negotiations long underway and the ASEAN Economic Community set to become a reality on the final day of this year, the agriculture sector may be exposed to a swathe of new opportunities.

Yet the industry is struggling due to bottlenecks including access to land and capital, inadequate management and implementation of policies.

Vietnam agriculture sector now attracts about 70% of the labour force and contribute to 20% for the country's GDP. Shifting from quite outdated, scattered production practices towards high tech farming is the government’s next ambition. Besides the application of high technology to the production process, the development of agriculture sector depends significantly on the changes in the mindset of the farmers and people involved in agricultural production.