Proposing Eco-label for farm produce

The Vietnam Academy of Agriculture Science in collaboration with the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) held national workshop on agroecological approach for sustainable transformation on September 16.

Prof. Ph.D Nguyen Hong Son, Director of the VAAS said over the past year Vietnam’s agriculture has achieved important developments. From a hunger country, Vietnam has become a global exporter of agricultural products.

However, in the face of diseases and natural disasters along with the dependence on intensive farming method, overexploiting natural resources Vietnam’s agriculture will be confronted with a lot of problems in the future.

“To achieve the goal of sustainable growth Vietnam must switch to a new development model that is integrated with sustainable natural resource management. Transforming the production into ecological agriculture is a right path to develop Vietnam food system towards transparency, responsibility and sustainability,” Son said.

According to the VAAS’s leader, Vietnam has expressed commitments to sustainable growth at many international conferences. The commitment was once again specified in the 12th Party Congress Resolution dated April 2021. As part of that commitment, Vietnam developed its new agricultural strategy -“Ecological Agriculture – Modern rural areas – Smart farmers”

Remi Nono Womdim, the FAO Representative to Vietnam, Co-chairman of the conference highly appreciated Vietnam’s efforts, saying that FAO initiated and mobilized resources to support agroecological transition processes since 2014.

With the help of multiple partners, FAO has developed a global analytical framework for the multidimensional assessment of the performance of agroecology: the Tool for Agroecology Performance Evaluation (TAPE)

Vietnam’s agricultural management agencies at different levels can apply this tool. It’s time for agricultural sector to move from policies to actions,” said Womdim.

Assoc. Ph.D Dao The Anh, Deputy Director of the VAAS said ecological agriculture is not a new concept but in the past less attention was paid to economic and social factors. Modern views explain 10 principal components of eco-agriculture approach: diversity, knowledge sharing, resonance, efficiency, renewability, resilience, humane value, traditional cuisine and culture, responsible governance, circular economy and sustainability.

Because of the mutual interaction of these10 components, it’s necessary to have synchronous approaches from all stakeholders to make agroecology spill over globally. Dao The Anh believed that the products created from ecological agriculture should be labeled.

“It’s the pressing and necessary requirement to improve the position of our agriculture,” he emphasized. 

Vietnam has currently developed six approaches of ecological agriculture including agro-forestry, Integrated Pest Management, system of rice Intensification, integrated crop-livestock-aquaculture    farming, organic farming and landscape conservation

Nguyen Quy Duong, Deputy Director of the Plant Protection Department expressed “Instead of focusing on killing pests we now have to care about soil health, human health, plant heath and vegetation surrounding as well.”

2021 is the pivotal year for Vietnam’s agriculture with a shift from agricultural production to agricultural economy. Nguyen Do Anh Tuan, Director of the International Cooperation Department under the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development said ecological agriculture can be seen as a comprehensive solution to solve non-traditional problems such as the Covid-19 pandemic.