Towards establishing trading center for OCOP & Mekong delta specialities in Hanoi

At a recent meeting held in Can Tho with heads of Agriculture and Rural Development Departments of 13 provinces in the Mekong River Delta, Deputy Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development - Mr. Le Minh Hoan suggested the establishment of a trading center located in Hanoi for products of the One Commune, One Product programme and local specialities of the Mekong Delta area.

Deputy Minister said that in order to support the implementation of regional integration policies, he had discussed the idea of such establishment with Mr. Le Quang Manh, Secretary of Can Tho Party Committee, Ms. Vo Thi Anh Xuan, Secretary of the An Giang Party Committee, and several heads of Party Committees of provinces in the Mekong Delta.

According to Mr. Hoan, Dong Thap is the first locality to successfully erect in Hanoi a center for their agricultural signature products, which has been operating for almost a year. With this result, we have to think about an idea that the whole Mekong Delta should introduce into Hanoi their specialities and OCOP products. Vice versa, the Capital city’s should also be brought back into the Delta, thus to create a rotation in which localities provide each other with their own homegrown products.

For its part, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development hopes that the center will play the role of a trading space, not only just a showcase or a fair that happens once in a blue moon. Here at the center, each locality will be allocated a task, for example, to organize a culture event with the area’s signature to further create and highlight their image.

One important purpose of such event is to combine cultures by introducing the image of the Mekong Delta in Hanoi through images of products grown in each locality of the Delta. By that time, we would develop a domestic market with 100 million people in Vietnam.

This is also an approach to support for localities in the consumption of their products, in order to succeed together, like a proverb that reads, “If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.” To realise the idea of the center, the project implementation plan and scheme are to be approved in February 2021.

In March or April 2021, the showroom and office areas of the center will be designed and constructed. In May 2021, the launch of the center in Hanoi as well as trade promotions will be organized.