Digital transformation boost agriculture and rural economic development

The Ministry of Information and Communication organised an online dialogue 'Transparency, multi-values ​​promote agricultural and rural economic development.

Digital transformation is a global trend that Vietnam is also promoting as part of its industrial revolution 4.0. In agriculture, digital transformation helps connect millions of farming households with processors, traders and suppliers.

Digital transformation also opens up new consumption channels to help narrow the gap between producers and consumers, ensuring transparency of commercial transactions and thus creating a healthy business environment for agricultural products.

Speaking at the dialogue, Director of the Postal Department Nguyen Vu Hong Thanh said that digital transformation was an opportunity and a challenge for the country's agricultural sector towards sustainable and long-term development. At the same time, it helps increase the value of Vietnamese agricultural products for a sustainable export".

Many agricultural products have been shaped as national brands such as longan, lychee, dragon fruit, banana. The next thing to do is how to make farmers master digital skills, proficient in the application and use of digital technology platforms to meet the current market requirements. This will pave the way to transparency, multi-values for the development of agriculture and the rural economy.

The Ministry of Information and Communications issued Decision 1034/QD-BTTT on July 21, 2021, to engage 5 million agricultural production households to e-commerce floors, promote the development of the digital economy in agriculture and rural areas in 2021. In the following time, 24 million farming households are expected to fundamentally change their approach, production and consumption methods, thereby adding value for the economy as well as digitizing agriculture and rural areas.

Dong Thap is a southern province with a favourable climate for many types of crops and fruits such as longan, guava, mango, orange and tangerine.

During the past time, especially the COVID-19 pandemic, Dong Thap Provincial Post Office is the unit that directly operates and implements plans to support farmers in introducing farming products on its e-commerce platform Postmart.vn.

A total of 255 tons of fruits and agricultural products in Dong Thap province have been sold through the Post Office, and 23,694 production households have joined the e-commerce platform.

Nguyen Hong Phi, Deputy Director of Dong Thap Post Office said that they was thinking much of how to improve efficiency and increase income for farmers, especially during the Covid-19 pandemic.

He said digital transformation brought great benefits to farmers. They could overcome the inherent weakness of depending on traders, being passive in finding outputs and consuming agricultural products.

“By successfully applying digital transformation in agriculture, farmers can now easily introduce the product origin and farming process to sellers and consumers. In addition, farmers are also proactive in finding wholesale partners as well as retailers, processing factories to consumers through Postmart.vn e-commerce platform which has no geographical limitation,” he said.

Ngo Quang Tuyen - Deputy Director of the Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism said that the agriculture-tourism combined model generated positive effects, promoting and creating outputs for agricultural products, as well as adding new attractive and environmentally friendly tourism products. From that fact, Dong Thap province has set out specific programs and plans to connect interdisciplinary sectors, creating new and promising directions.

“Currently, in Dong Thap province, there are 60 active agritourism sites and more than 40 under construction. The deployment of agricultural tourism has brought many benefits to the province when expanding tourism space and increasing incomes by 2 to 3 times for farmers.

The Provincial Party Committee and People's Committee of Dong Thap province,  departments and agencies also identify agro-tourism as a strategy that can help farmers stabilize their lives and production," he said.