HCM City (VNA/VNA) – Ho Chi Minh Cityis seeking to improve the traceability of agricultural produce sold throughboth modern and traditional retail channels to improve food safety.

By the end of this year, it aims to have allgoods sold through modern distribution channels meet VietGap standards, haveproper packaging and brands and be traceable through mobile phones, accordingto the municipal Department of Industry and Trade.

The city has been piloting ways to improvetraceability of the products since January last year.

Cu Chi district’s Phu Loc Agricultural Cooperativehas for instance been using QR code stamps, which allow customers to see theentire farming and transportation process.

The Department of Agriculture and RuralDevelopment has been organising training classes for farmers and providing themwith equipment to upload data about product origin.

Binh Chanh district’s Phuoc An Agricultural Cooperativesaid ever since it began to affix the QR stamps the reputation of its productshad been rising.

However, Phu Loc has to cope with manychallenges: The wide variety of its produce means it requires skilled andmeticulous supervisors, while maintaining the systems and restocking stamps arecostly.

Data entry is not too efficient, with officialshaving to meet each farmer to collect data while traceable produce is not apriority for many retailers and distributors.  

The Ministry of Industry and Trade said mosttraditional markets, which account for most of the food distributed in thecountry, sell goods whose origins are not traceable and do not keep records orreceipts.

Phuoc An said many farmers were still strugglingto enter data using modern technology, and unstable internet connections in remoteareas meant that uploading data could take a long time.

Dao Ha Trung, Chairman of the HCM City HighTechnology Association, said developing a comprehensive database for variousvegetables and medicinal herbs and contacting all the provinces that supplyproduce to HCM City were extremely difficult tasks.

The association was working on using affordabletechnologies to help co-operatives improve their products’ traceability.

A representative of GS1 Vietnam, a barcodeorganisation, said many businesses in HCM City’s wholesale markets usedbarcodes to keep track of goods sold.

However, they did not have a consistent standardfor product tracing and it planned to create one, it said.

According to a survey by the association, thecity’s wholesale markets receive around 2.5 million tonnes of vegetables andfruits from other provinces.

After agricultural goods, the city will shiftits focus to other foods.-VNS/VNA