Resource information
Over the past quarter century, Vietnam’s
agricultural sector has made enormous progress. Vietnam’s
performance in terms of agricultural yields, output, and
exports, however, has been more impressive than its gains in
efficiency, farmer welfare, and product quality. Vietnamese
agriculture now sits at a turning point. The agricultural
sector now faces growing domestic competition - from cities,
industry, and services - for labor, land, and water. Rising
labor costs are beginning to inhibit the sector’s ability to
compete globally as a low cost producer of bulk
undifferentiated commodities. Going forward, Vietnam’s
agricultural sector needs to generate more from less. That
is, it must generate more economic value - and farmer and
consumer welfare - using less natural and human capital and
less harmful intermediate inputs. The strategic shift was
highlighted in the government’s agricultural restructuring
plan (ARP), approved by the Prime Minister in June 2014. The
ARP defines sector goals in terms of the triple bottom line
of economically, socially, and environmentally sustainable
development. It lays out expected changes in the roles and
spending patterns of the government in the sector and
discusses the need to work with other stakeholders,
including in the private sector. It calls for an ambitious
and ongoing process of learning and experimentation, and
several potential directions are offered in this report.
