Agricultural restructuring is essential to raise the productivity,quality and value of agricultural products while ensuring the sector’ssustainable development in the Mekong Delta region, experts said at aseminar in Soc Trang province on November 5.

According to the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, theMekong Delta, comprising one city and 12 provinces, accounts for 27.2percent of the country’s agricultural land.

As the largestfarming area in the country, the region contributes 40.7 percent of thenational agro-forestry output, 53.4 percent of rice, 70 percent of fruitand 68.7 percent of seafood.

Ninety percent of the country’s rice export volume and 70 percent of seafood export turnover come from the region.

However, current farming practice in the region is posing challengesto the environment. Local farmers remain poor despite the bulk of goodsthey produce.

Delegates at the seminar, which ispart of the ongoing Mekong Delta Economic Cooperation Forum (MDEC SocTrang 2014), put forth initiatives, measures and policies to boost thesustainable development of the local agricultural sector.

Ministerof Agriculture and Rural Development Cao Duc Phat said the regionallocalities should focus on deploying clean production models meetingGAP, VietGAP and GlobalGAP standards to improve the quality ofVietnamese agricultural products.

He stressed theneed to train human resources for the sector to meet the shift in labourstructure expected during the agricultural restructuring.

Theminister also called for attention to improving the region’s irrigationsystem to deal with climate change and natural disasters.-VNA