Promoting collective trademarks for kumquat trees

Among all the kumquat growing areas, the Van Giang District, Hung Yen province has been granted a collective trademark for their production of big, bright and yellow kumquats with dark green leaves. However, Van Giang kumquat trees have faced a price squeeze as they have not fully taken advantage of the trademark.

A collective trademark for Van Giang kumquats has been granted but local gardeners have not made use of the advantage. Only 1% of them apply the trademark to identify their products.

“Local people here don't understand how label application differs from traditional techniques. Only 45 out of 1000 households here apply the recognized trademark at their farms”, Thieu Van Toan, Chairman of Thang Loi communeFarmer's Association, Thang Loi Commune in Hung Yen Province said.

“Label application costs very little. Compared to the hundreds of dollars invested on the kumquat trees, it only costs 10 USD at most”, Nguyen Dinh Vuong who is the head of the Specialized Devision of Hung Yen Dept. of Science and Technology said.

Recognizing the people's struggles when it comes to launching their products to the market, the local department of Science and Technology has worked out some initiatives to support them.

“We are trying to educate people about marketing - for example, using a collective trademark in their transactions. We have also supported them in establishing websites and organizing trade fairs to display their products and to connect to businesses, traders and consumers”, Phan Thi Hong Van, leader of Hung Yen Brands Promotion Project said.

Authorities expect Van Giang kumquat trees to be effectively developed in order to manage, exploit and encourage trademark usage. This will eventually improve the value and reputation of the province's products in the market.