Dr. Dao The Anh: Agriculture should be a public service

Assoc. Prof. Dr. Dao The Anh, former Deputy Director of the Vietnam Academy of Agricultural Sciences and President of the Viet Nam Association for Rural Development Sciences, shares his insights with the Agriculture and Environment Newspaper in the series "Scientists' strength".

The experience of Europe and China

I pursued my master's and doctoral degrees in France and observed that the state invests heavily in basic research. Basic research is primarily housed within state-funded institutes and universities, which are only partially self-reliant on tuition revenue.

The reason the state must sustain basic research is that its products cannot be put into production immediately; instead, they must pass through applied research stages with interdisciplinary cooperation for dissemination. Every year, professors and laboratory heads proactively propose to the state what problems they will research and approximately how much money they require. Once funded, the laboratory head has the authority to recruit doctoral candidates, post-docs, and technical staff, and will deliver the results at the end of the year. They do not have to worry much about financial procedures.

Bài liên quan

Scientists' strength: [1] Thoughts of a former institute director

Scientists' strength: [2] Key laboratory crisis

Research serving the community or smallholder farmers is mostly funded by the state, as this is regarded as a public service. As for enterprises, they also invest in scientific research, but only in areas where they can generate revenue, such as seeds and plant protection products, rather than serving all producers' needs.

Viet Nam is currently attempting to merge scientific units to create changes. This might meet today's requirements; however, a few years later, when research content requirements shift, that organization will become obsolete again.

France does not merge its research units; instead, it prioritizes inter-agency research organized around priority topic groups. The state grants research funding according to these interdisciplinary groups, and researchers are required to participate.

In the past, when China's old-style state farms and cooperatives were dismantled, its agriculture also returned to smallholder production models. There was a period after the 1980s, during economic reforms, when they also suffered from a lack of investment resources in agriculture, leading to a self-reliance policy implemented for about 10 years.

Specifically, each scientist or scientific unit was permitted to establish an enterprise to commercialize research products, using the money to reinvest in science. The scientist enjoyed the copyrights from selling those products, and the state did not reclaim them. However, the clients of Chinese agricultural science were smallholder farmers, making it very difficult to sell science and technology products. Meanwhile, the state needed to boost production among smallholders, not only to ensure their families had enough to eat but also to guarantee national food security, so it still had to invest in agricultural science.

Similarly, Viet Nam has a policy of allocating land to farming households through Product Contract 10, which stimulated production, ensuring food security and agricultural exports. However, the state must invest in agricultural scientific research as well as provide services such as seeds, agricultural extension, and irrigation... for farming households to develop.

After conducting science self-reliance in that manner for a number of years, China realized that the returns from selling agricultural science products were minimal, making it impossible to reinvest according to global scientific trends, thereby causing them to fall behind in science and technology. If left unchecked, it would affect the entire agricultural sector and food security, so the state had to invest in agricultural science again. Where did they get the money? From allocating a portion of the taxes collected from industry and services. The state pays sufficient salaries to scientists at research institutes, ensuring adequate living conditions for them.

Fully providing for the livelihood and research conditions of scientists

Bài liên quan

Scientists' strength: [3] Cold shivers in the gene bank

Scientists' strength: [4] Struggling to make ends meet

I have visited many agricultural research institutes in China and seen very complete public housing provided for young cadres to reside in. Research conditions have also been greatly improved, particularly through the use of highly modern laboratories. The state also has a policy of appointing institutional cadres as research professors if they participate in guiding doctoral candidates and in scientific publishing.

At first, China had to cooperate with France and the US in research, but now it has developed its own proprietary technologies. Previously, China lacked leading researchers, so it enacted a policy to attract 1,000 talented global professors, offering salaries even higher than those in the US and France.

This cohort of professors trained young Chinese scientists, helping to shorten the technology gap with developed countries. They also invited international scientists to chair their scientific programs, serving not only domestic needs but also those of other countries.

Previously, due to the self-reliance policy, many Chinese scientists managed to stay abroad after finishing their studies. The state attracted them to return by guaranteeing living and research conditions. The recruitment criteria for research civil servants in China are currently quite high. Furthermore, they reformed the scientific journal publication system.

There was a period when China encouraged its scientists to write articles for international journals. But recently, as their scientific team has grown stronger, they do not necessarily have to write articles for international journals; instead, they focus on publishing in Chinese journals, which also have English versions. Thanks to this, a number of Chinese scientific journals have been elevated globally.

I have traveled to some African countries, and they highly desire to learn from Viet Nam, how a post-war country not only secured food security but also exported agricultural products among the world's top ranks. They also implemented land reforms by allocating land to farmers. However, Vietnamese farmers lack access to research services on new varieties, cultivation techniques, agricultural extension, irrigation, and fertilizers, so they still cannot ensure their own food security.

Many nations dream of having a rice seed collection like Viet Nam's, suitable for all regions and all difficult conditions. For instance, even though the Philippines hosts the International Rice Research Institute on its soil, the state does not invest enough in agricultural science, so it still has to import food...

The first agricultural institute in our country was the Institute of Cultivation, the predecessor of the Viet Nam Academy of Agricultural Sciences, established in 1952, as the State recognized that after the war, the most important priority was ensuring food security.

During that period, all talented individuals were prioritized for agricultural training, and we were supported by China and the Soviet Union, which contributed to the development of the Green Revolution. However, up to now, under the pressure of financial self-reliance, agricultural science has been declining, especially because living conditions are too low, forcing many people to sell goods online or take on side jobs, which means their minds cannot focus on research.

With the current large number of agricultural scientific cadres, I think a reduction is necessary. But the problem is that many talented people are leaving, making it difficult to train leading research cadres in the field. Agricultural universities and traditional disciplines such as cultivation, forestry, and agricultural chemistry and soil science face very low enrollment, which will long affect the agricultural science sector due to a lack of generational succession.

Some countries consider agriculture a public service serving the community, similar to healthcare and education, so the state must invest. I think we in Vietnam should also consider agriculture as such a public service and need to support students studying agriculture just like in several other disciplines.