HCM City (VNA) – A workshop was heldin Ho Chi Minh City on December 4 to seek measures for boosting public-privatepartnerships (PPP) towards sustainably developing Vietnam’s coffee sector – oneof the world’s leading coffee exporters.

Do Nguyen Anh Tuan – deputy head of the VietnamCoffee Coordination Board and Director of the Institute of Policy and Strategyfor Agriculture and Rural Development – said Vietnamese coffee businesses arefacing challenges such as climate change, water supply shortage, diseases,unstable prices, and a lack of market information.

What the sector needs to do now is to improve itsfarming process to reduce costs and maximise profits to make up for the outputdecline as a result of coffee tree re-cultivation.

Coffee productivity is at about 2.5 tonnes perha at present. Coffee beans will not be able to be harvested for three yearsafter trees are re-cultivated to replace old ones. The coffee output will fallby 300,000 tonnes due to re-cultivation each year, according to the Ministry ofAgriculture and Rural Development.

Tuan said the country will need to re-cultivate120,000ha of coffee while still maintaining a stable output so that the exportvalue does not decrease. One solution to this issue is applying the PPP model betweenbusinesses, the State, and farmers.

The demand for production expansion and stableconsumption will be the driving force for this PPP model, said agriculturalexpert Dang Kim Son.

He noted that farmers still face difficulties incultivation, harvesting, preservation, and processing, leading to the limitedvolume of quality coffee. While most enterprises are small and weak, supportpolicies for them remain ineffective, and economic integration and climatechange have also affected their production, processing, and trading capacity.

[Video: Urgent solutions needed to boost cof⛎fee’s sector]

Participants in the workshop said cooperativesshould join together in purchasing production materials and selling coffee beans,while ensuring that product quality meets the requirements of businesses.

Meanwhile, businesses need to specify productionrequirements, purchase coffee via cooperatives or other farmers’ organisationsin line with contracts, and support farmers’ organisations.

At the event, the Daklak Import-Export Co., Ltd.,said the connectivity between businesses and farmers’ organisations will helpfirms cut expenses and farmers buy cheaper production materials with ensuredquality.

An official of the agricultural ministry’sDepartment of Crop Production said that PPPs in the coffee sector remain modest,with only Nestle Vietnam having joined in this model so far.

The Nestle Vietnam project, carried out in theCentral Highlands since 2011, has provided training for 200,000 farmers andsupported them with 20 million coffee saplings to re-cultivate 20,000ha of oldtrees. It has helped raise productivity by 17 percent and farmers’ income by 14percent.

However, this project has only covered 17percent of the total area in need of re-cultivation. Hence, workshopparticipants concluded that in order to help the coffee sector developsustainably, more PPP projects are necessary. –VNA