In search of measures for elevation of farm produce brand-name positions

Dau Tieng district People’s Committee has just summed its One Commune One Product (OCOP) 2020 and proposed orientation and tasks for 2021. At the meeting, OCOP operative staff of Dau Tieng district listened to experience sharing of localities regarding their obstacles and challenges in selecting and developing groups of farm produces in the district.

Organic orange of An Lap has become more and more popular among consumers

Preliminary proficiency

In 2020, Dau Tieng district has actively mobilized individuals and organizations that are economic entities such as businesses, cooperatives, and households to join OCOP. Accordingly, the district has coordinated with Binh Duong provincial OCOP Executive Board to organize many training courses for economic entities on contents related to production process construction plans, branding and market development for products and services.

Vo Van Tam, Deputy Head of the Economic Division of Dau Tieng district, said that although many difficulties in standardizing technologies, production lines and scale of production and business to participate in the OCOP Program existed, over the past years, the district has actively propagated and mobilized economic entities about the benefits of participating in OCOP. By the efforts of the district and localities, initially, most economic entities in the district have agreed, supported and participated in the program.

As a result, after a year of implementing the OCOP program, a number of branded agricultural product groups have been formed in the area. Accordingly, through advocacy and propaganda, communes and towns have had a number of typical agricultural products and received positive feedbacks from the market and consumers such as An Lap cantaloupe, Thanh Tuyen mangosteen, Minh Hoa citrus, Thanh An durian, Long Hoa lingzhi mushroom, Minh Hoa honey, Minh Tan bird's nest etc.

In addition to the above products, through the OCOP program, Dau Tieng district has also formed more typical product groups in the direction of developing key product groups such as fresh foods, other herbs, raw and preliminary processed foods. According to the district's orientation, the agricultural products belonging to the above groups are the strengths and potentials available in the locality. As long as a standardized development orientation is in place, the specialization will be able to become the key products contributing to the socio-economic development of the district in the coming time.

Help needed locally

The year 2020 is the first of OCOP program implementation, localities and participants have not fully understood many of the program's contents; thereby, they are still facing many difficulties and confusion in the implementation. In addition, subjects such as businesses, cooperatives, household and economic models when invited to participate also expressed hesitation due to the requirements on the scale and quality of the production and business stages on joining the program.

At the meeting, leaders of communes and towns in Dau Tieng district all said that OCOP is one of the meaningful and strategic programs in building and developing special economic zones and in spreading service brands, products and good competition to the markets. However, most of the localities and subjects invited to participate in the program have been still facing some difficulties and problems of product registration according to the set criteria.

Accordingly, most of the local products circulating in Dau Tieng district lack some important criteria such as quality standards which have not been announced; the criteria for food safety and hygiene which have not been tested, packaging design, labels, traceability stamps, trademarks, trade promotion and so on. To meet the above requirements, businesses, cooperatives, and household economic models need help with sufficient capital to build processes and standards to develop service and product brands.

Tran Quang Tuyen, Deputy Chairman of Dau Tieng district People's Committee acknowledged the contributions of localities, and at the same time, requested the Economic Divisions of the district, communes and towns to continue promoting propaganda and mobilization of individuals, groups, and organizations, especially the agricultural economic models of cooperatives and households participating in the OCOP Program. Tuyen expected that in 2021-2025, each locality will have at least one quality agricultural product to creating good impression on the markets and consumers when hearing about Dau Tieng agricultural product brands.