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MANKATO, Minn. — Did you know that Minnesota soybeans regularly make their way halfway around the world to Vietnam? Soybeans are the top crop exported from Minnesota. Many go to Vietnam thanks to the efforts of the Minnesota Soybean Research and Promotion Council and the U.S. Soybean Export Council. As Vietnam's economy has become more industrialized, citizens are looking for better calorie sources, including animal protein. Knowing that those animals need to eat, MSR&PC made a strategic investment in Vietnam, funding three staff members and an officer there to encourage the import of Minnesota soybeans.

DakLak — Many cows and buffaloes in the central highlands province of DakLak have died from eating indigestible food after a serious shortage of drinking water and food caused by a heat wave, local agricultural authorities said.

Over 130 oxen have died from severe drought while thousands of other cattle and poultry are struggling with the lack of water and nutrition in a Dak Lak Province district in Vietnam’s Central Highlands. The devastating climate has caused 83 oxen in Ia Lop Commune and 50 more in Ia Rve Commune in Ea Sup District to die, while destroying hundreds of hectares of crops and draining 91 drilled wells in the locality, the local Office of Agriculture and Rural Development said on Wednesday.

As unsafe food has become a big concern of Vietnamese consumers, many foreign enterprises consider this an investment opportunity. Recently, 13 Canadian pork exporting enterprises have come to Vietnam to learn about trade opportunities. "Canadian pork exports to Vietnam impressively increased by 230% in 2015. This shows the great potential of the market for Canadian pork products and it is testament to the Vietnamese consumer’s trust in the quality and safety of this product," said Canadian Ambassador to Vietnam David Devine. David Lennarz, Vice President of Registrar Corp (USA), operating in the field of consultancy and support enterprises to comply with the regulations of the US Food and Drug Administration (USFDA), said a lot American businesses want to invest in the food industry of Vietnam through projects producing safe food.

Nearly 100 percent of all cattle and aquaculture farms in Vietnam have been found to be feeding their herd antibiotics to prevent diseases, according to a recent report by the country’s animal health authority. While salbutamol, a chemical making livestock produce more meat, is banned and strictly monitored by authorities, the use of antibiotics is still left unregulated, sparking new fears about excessive residues in food.

ĐẮK LẮK – More than 130 cows and thousands of chickens and ducks died from drought in Ea Súp District in the Central Highlands province of Đắk Lắk, according to the latest statistics from the provincial Department of Agriculture and Rural Development. The cows and birds died due to a shortage of drinking water and nutrition. In Ia Lốp Commune alone, more than 80 cows died, whereas Ia Rvê Commune had more than 50 cow deaths.

Coffee producers may need a wake-up call. Soaring demand for the caffeinated brew could hasten destructive climate change by encouraging producers to chop down some of the last remaining tropical forests as they struggle to increase yields on existing farmland, according to a report released Thursday by the nonprofit Conservation International. Coffee grows in tropical countries near the equator, such as Indonesia, Brazil and Uganda, where thick jungles rich with biodiversity provide fresh water and store tons of carbon. Farmers expand their fields by felling trees in these forests and burning the dense underbrush — releasing that carbon into the atmosphere, where it traps other gases and warms the planet. As a result, deforestation is a twofold environmental catastrophe: Left intact, forests absorb many of the pollutants that cause global warming. Destroyed, they unleash even more emissions and speed up the pace of climate change. 

[JAKARTA] Pests and disease outbreaks are threatening to decrease cassava production by 30-40 per cent this year in South-East Asia, home of the world’s largest cassava producers.  The pestilence will endanger the livelihood of 40 million people in the region, according to a recent study published in Pest Management Science. “Cassava witches’ broom disease has spread substantially and is currently found at high infestation levels in western Thailand, central Vietnam, Cambodia and the Philippines.”

Vietnamese rice exporters have been told to try to penetrate non-China markets to make bigger profits. However, they have not made efforts to attack markets in France and the US.  Vietnam, which has been exporting rice for 30 years, China remains the largest market which consumes 50 percent of its total export volume. However, exports to China can only bring modest profits, while Vietnam’s rice remains unknown to Chinese consumers. Though Chinese import millions of tons of rice from Vietnam, the rice products available at supermarkets in China don’t bear Vietnamese brands.