Vietnam cashew association building material zone in Cambodia

Vietnam’s raw cashew nut import increases year by year while domestic supply meets 20-30 percent of processing plants’ demand so Vietnam Cashew Association (Vinacas) has worked with Cambodia to develop a material zone of 500,000 hectares.

Workers examine peeled cashew nuts at a processing plant in Vietnam (Photo: SGGP)

The import volume exceeded 1.1 million tons in 2016 and neared 1.5 million tons in 2017 from only tens of thousands of tons in previous years. Businesess have mainly imported the nut from African nations especially Côte d'Ivoire.

Vinacas hoped that cooperation with Cambodia will create a material zone providing one million tons a year in the future.

According to Mr. Nguyen Duc Thanh, chairman of Vinacas, besides building domestic material zones to prevent area reduction and increase productivity, the association has surveyed some Cambodian places adjacent to Vietnam and realized that local soil conditions are similar to southeast region, the capital of Vietnam’s cashew industry, and suitable with cashew growth.

In fact, Cambodia is one of cashew production nations with stable quality thanks to good sapling. Especially Cambodia’s Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries has paid attention to re-planting cashew trees to improve crop yield and income for farmers.

Head of the Agricultural Department under the ministry Hean Vann Horn said that Cambodia cashew area has strongly reduced so if production organization and consumption is good, the material zone development would be feasible.

For the last two years, raw cashew export from Cambodia to Vietnam has topped 90 percent from only 30 percent in 2014 and before.

Mr. Hean Vann Horn said that Cambodian side hoped Vinacas to assist them from sapling selecting, farming process, harvest technique and preservation to improve productivity and cashew quality to ensure profit for Cambodian farmers.

According to the Vietnamese Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, the country exported 350,000 tons of cashew nuts last year with the turnover of $3.5 billion, up 1.9 percent in volume and 23.8 percent in value over 2016.

Cashew ranks first in the group of major export commodities including vegetable, coffee, rice and pepper.

The nut consumption increases about 10 percent a year in the world while area increase possibility is only five percent. This is a condition for the cashew industry to develop in the upcoming time.

International Nut and Dried Fruit Council (INC) said that dried nut transaction value approximates $30 billion a year in the global market. With this trend, cashew will account for nearly 29 percent of the world market share by 2021, followed by walnut.