VnSAT project builds a sustainable coffee chain

The Vietnam Sustainable Agriculture Transformation Project ('VnSAT project') is implemented for five years (from 2015 to 2020) and is extended until June 30, 2022. In Dak Lak province, the Project focuses on supporting ten districts, towns, and cities in the province's coffee areas.

According to Mr. Nguyen Hoai Duong, Director of Dak Lak Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, the Project's goal in Dak Lak province is to be 60,000 farmers to benefit from 50 farmer organizations (cooperatives/cooperative groups) on the total coffee area of 15,000 hectares trained and applied sustainable farming processes.

Up to now, most of the targets set out by the VnSAT Project have been completed and exceeded. Specifically, there are 64 farmer organizations supported by the Project (reaching 128% of the plan) with more than 72,000 farmers (reaching 120% of the program) benefited, and the coffee area applied sustainable farming process is nearly 20,000 hectares (reaching 133% of the program).

The effectiveness of the VnSAT Project is apparent, contributing to the development of the local coffee industry in particular and the country in general in a sustainable direction, thereby increasing coffee output and quality, meeting the demand in the world market, and creating stable jobs, improve material, spiritual and income lives for people in the project area and the whole of Dak Lak province.

In the coming time, Dak Lak province will publish a list of coffee seedling nurseries that meet VnSAT standards to serve the needs of coffee replanting. Simultaneously, the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development will inform and propagate about the effectiveness and positive impacts of the VnSAT project to people throughout the province.

The VnSAT project has supported farmer organizations to produce coffee sustainably. The project also supports many farmer organizations to invest in infrastructure, helping to improve coffee quality, meeting domestic and export needs of businesses. As a result, the linkage chain in the coffee industry from production to consumption towards long-term sustainability is also gradually being formed.

Most of the organizations and individuals producing coffee in the project area have links with coffee purchasing, processing and exporting enterprises such as Ea Kmat - Hoa Dong cooperative (Krong Pac district) associated with DAKMAN Vietnam Co., Ltd., Ea Tan Cooperative (Krong Nang District) associated with Import-Export Company 2-9 (SIMXCO), Quyet Tien Cooperative (Cu M'gar District) associated with Joint Stock Company Dak Lak import-export investment (INEXIM).

To help farmers replant and use capital effectively, the VnSAT project in Dak Lak has trained 686 FFS classes, with a total of 23,943 farmers participating in learning and applying sustainable coffee production and re-cultivation processes. In addition, 64 farmer organizations were trained in sustainable coffee production and replanting procedures, reaching 128% of the number of farmer organizations in the Project area.

Mr. Nguyen Hoai Duong said that farmers in Dak Lak province have used loans for the proper purposes, bringing high efficiency such as the orchards to grow well, with increased productivity and quality... contributing to increasing income for people sustainably.

However, compared with actual needs, it shows that one of the fundamental reasons why coffee replanting has not met the province's general plan is that coffee growers have limited access to and loans for replanting. The loan rate for replanting is still low.

The main reason is due to the problems of procedures and unfavorable loan limits. Therefore, the State Bank should soon have instructions to direct commercial banks to pay attention to support for farmers to access and borrow capital for replanting.

Currently, the VnSAT project has moved to the public investment stage, and the only difficulty is the Covid-19 epidemic affecting the construction progress of infrastructure works in the project areas.

In 2021, the VnSAT Project has disbursed more than VND 42 billion to implement nine infrastructure construction projects. It is expected that by the end of 2021, 50% of the total contract value will be completed. The progress is being accelerated to ensure the completion timely on June 30, 2022.

The Covid-19 epidemic in Dak Lak province is still complicated, so the concentration of farmers to organize training courses on science and technology transfer is still limited. To overcome this situation, the VnSAT Project Management Board of the province has carried out internal monitoring and inspection at the Cooperatives, combined with the integration of consultation activities with ethnic minorities on the needs of sustainable coffee farming training (FFS).

In addition to the support project's capital for infrastructure investment, beneficiaries in the project area must also contribute 20%. But in many project implementation areas, cooperatives and people can not pay to contribute, which affects the project implementation process. Therefore, from 2020 to now, Dak Lak province has advocated support this 20% capital to ensure that the project is implemented smoothly, and people soon benefit.

The VnSAT project has contributed significantly to the coffee industry in particular and the agricultural economic development of Dak Lak province. In the 2006-2010 period, the province's average GDP growth rate reached 11-12% per year. But in the 2016-2020 period, it increased to 12.5-13.5% per year; and the economic scale in 2020 increased by 1.5-1.6 times higher than 2015.