President, General Director of Unifarm shared the story of packing house, preserving agricultural products

One morning in early June, I received a phone call from Mr. Nguyen Phuc Nguyen - General Secretary of the Vietnam Fruit and Vegetable Association - asking to support output for a Laba banana growing cooperative in Lam Dong. A little surprised with the thought "a specialty banana like Laba is also difficult to consume", willing to be heavily indebted to Lam Dong agriculture, the Unifarm team just hit the road again.

Welcoming us was Ms. P, the head of a banana growing cooperative with several dozen members and more than 50 hectares of bananas in the full harvest season. She just took us to visit the field, while lamenting: "Bananas are almost ripe in this field, but no one buys him".

Not beyond my expectations, most of the banana growing area here is not properly grown, in which some households seem to have learned about the techniques of planting and taking care of banana trees, but have not yet arrived. place.

On the other hand, similar to most areas where bananas (and many other agricultural products) are grown by farmers from the South to the North where I have researched and consulted, such a large growing area but not a single one. packing house with a cold storage for basic agricultural products.

Seeing my question, she said: "A few years ago, traders just came to cut the room and take it away, what do they need a packing house for". She expressed surprise when I explained that the technically optimal time for a banana bunch from harvest, preliminary processing to complete packaging to put in cool storage is only 4 hours, after that must always ensure the temperature is 14 ^o C and the humidity is above 85% until the market for consumption. And so the cooperative is forced to have a packing house and preserve it right in the growing area. She pledged that if she was "rescued" and advised by Unifarm, she would invest for better results next season.

Until today, Unifarm has a plan to "rescue" the aforementioned cooperative, however, the story that I often speak at conferences on agriculture or in the media is: if you want to sell, start Invest in a packer with a standard cold storage system first.

Farming techniques and product standards for each market are imperative to understand before deciding which plants to invest in production, but without a packer, nothing can be done. Imagine, a farmer can grow a beautiful sparkling melon or a bunch of spotless bananas, but he doesn't have a packer and standard cold storage for preliminary processing, packaging and preservation. How do your products reach consumers (domestic and foreign)?

Yes, there was a time when Chinese merchants and the network of Vietnamese people they run could go to people's gardens to buy and pack them for themselves and take away for consumption, but that only happens when the goods are real. scarcity and when this huge market is still easygoing. And now, that story ... it's old Diem.

Writing here, suddenly remembered the question of a veteran journalist of Vietnam Agriculture Newspaper: "Do you think it is difficult for localities to issue planting area codes and packing house codes, but in many places there are still there is a situation of 'borrowing' the packing house code for export?".

The answer seems complicated but is actually very simple, the issue of the code is something the local agricultural management agency has to do, so it is not difficult at all, but the problem is how many packers do the farmers have? which level code house packer?

Just go to the big banana growing areas from Trang Bom - Dong Nai to Xuyen Moc - Vung Tau, it will be clear, in thousands of hectares of banana plantations of farmers, how many people have packing houses? So why do Chinese traders buy bananas in this area but have to "borrow" the code of packers in other regions. Well, that's normal in the district.

The story of rescuing agricultural products is not a new story, but it is still topical, taking place here and there every once in a while. Usually in each rescue, localities hold seminars to find solutions, and at the same time organize supply-demand matching programs with the participation of supermarket systems in Vietnam.

In these seminars, managers kept saying: deep processing factories must be established to create added value for agricultural products, and at the same time can be preserved for a long time to solve the situation of "good harvest season". The supermarket chains are committed to supporting farmers to buy agricultural products. Statements and commitments kept coming, and the rescue status kept coming up.

Why? Dear Sir, the specificity of the agricultural product processing industry is that it always gives priority to the use of products with designs that do not need to be too beautiful with the condition that the input costs must be low (due to the consumption norm of raw materials in the processing industry). The processing of agricultural products is often very large, for example, it takes 6 kg of fresh bananas to make 1 kg of dried bananas), and after production, it can be preserved for a long time, so although processing enterprises play an important role is very important in the agricultural industry, but usually only deals with about 30% of agricultural products produced with standards below grade 1, while 70% of grade 1 still has to be preliminarily processed, preserved and sold fresh for farmers to have words are.

As for supermarket systems, although they commit to buy and are willing to keep that commitment, in order to sell goods to supermarkets, agricultural products must meet safety standards, and at the same time must pack products methodically, logistics system for door-to-door delivery to stores, and an accounting system to track and reconcile debts. How many farms or households are able to do this?

As for me, when I am invited to speak in these forums, I still say over and over that growing areas need packers and cold storage to be able to preliminarily process, sort, pack and preserve agricultural products, together with the logistics system to be able to bring goods from the farm to the market for consumption quickly and cheaply. The job is easy, but it determines the ability to sell fresh agricultural products with high value or not, it needs to be done first.

Of course, the construction of this packing and preservation house must be placed in a total solution of pre-harvest farming, understanding the specifications and product standards of each product consuming market, post-harvest technology. planning, logistics...

In the near future, Vietnam's agricultural industry is about to have good news such as durian is about to be exported to China, longan is having the opportunity to be exported to Japan... Those are obviously extremely good opportunities for people. Grown domestically can export fresh products to these countries with high value. However, we need to be well prepared to seize this opportunity.

Specifically, the cultivation and harvesting of agricultural products with proper techniques is obvious and undisputed, but it is still a matter of what technology we classify, pack and preserve with what technology.

In which, businesses, farms and farmers need to focus on preliminary processing, sorting, packaging, preserving, handling and transporting agricultural products according to product characteristics and market needs. Having delicious fruit without the right technology to preserve that delicious fruit to the consumer market, the output problem will always remain difficult, especially when the easy market is gradually becoming difficult.

Basic things, seemingly trivial, are easy to say but not easy to do. Like Unifarm, from the time the idea of exporting melons abroad to the successful implementation, Unifarm took more than 1 year with several billion dong to research the solution.

In the process of transferring agricultural solutions to farmers from localities in Binh Duong province such as Phu Giao, Dau Tieng, and Ben Cat to other provinces such as Dong Nai, Lam Dong, Can Tho, Hanoi, and Ha Nam..., everywhere I go, I see shortcomings and the need for investment related to this issue of preliminary processing, packaging and preservation. Accordingly, large farms can invest on their own, while small farmers can link to invest through the role of cooperatives or local agricultural management agencies.