Vitalising the Vietnamese potato sector: read the results of year 2

How to achieve food security, improved nutrition and accelerate sustainable agriculture in Vietnam? How to increase the income of small scale farmers in Vietnam? 

The ‘Growing out of poverty with potato’ project aims to tackle this challenge and sets an example by creating a value chain for a high quality and sustainable potato production system in Vietnam. Since its launch in 2014, the ‘Growing out of poverty with potato’ project made a great deal of progress. The results up to March 2016:

In summary

Supply

• Field trials with 5 high-yielding potato varieties were successfully completed.
• Potato production enhancing equipment, like irrigation systems and machinery to plant and harvest potatoes was successfully tested.
• 950 farmers (of which 70% female) received a training certificate after attending 3 potato training modules regarding potato production.
• Training of 14 potato production advisors was completed. Potato production advisors will visit contract farmers at least once every two weeks to assist them in optimizing their production performance.

Demand

• Over 200.000 consumers were reached through awareness campaigns in wet markets and supermarkets in Hanoi and HCMC.
• 400 consumers were interviewed to get more insight in their potato preferences.
• Food labs: 400 consumers participated in the sensory evaluation of potato varieties.
• 50 households prepared 4 selected potato varieties at home and provided feedback per potato variety.

Supply chain development

• 10 field days were organized and attended by 6 traders and over 350 farmers.
• 353 farmers signed contracts with traders to deliver potatoes.

Policy development

• 2 meetings were organized with the Potato Policy Discussion platform
• In cooperation with all partners, Dutch embassy, Vietnamese authorities and research institutes a policy brief was completed with recommendations to strengthen the Vietnamese potato sector.

For more in-depth information about the progress in year 2 of the ‘Growing out of Poverty’ with potato project and projection to year 3 kindly download the full newsletter of Year 2 below: