Flower growers look to online sales amid COVID-19 resurgence Workers at a flower farm in Da Lat City. Traditionally, city dwellers shop for flowers and botanicals at flower markets to fill their home with the most cheerful blooms to celebrate the new year. But many flower growers said that flower markets were not busy this year, leaving them with an oversupply. Nguyen Duy, a flower farm owner in Da Lat City, said that COVID-19 outbreaks in many localities would likely affect people's purchasing power for flowers ahead of Tet festival. Thuy Vu, director of the The Gioi Hoa Tuoi JSC, a wholesale supplier of flowers, said it would not focus on retail sales for the Tet festival this year due to market uncertainty. Nguyen Thi Ngoc Lan, a flower vendor at Ho Thi Ky flower market in HCM City, said flowers stockpiled for the Tet market this year were not as numerous as last year due to concerns over weak purchasing power. Purchasing orders with flower farms are expected to change in the next few days depending on the control of COVID-19, Lan said. Flower farms in Da Lat City have seen a 55 per cent drop in orders from wholesale markets in other cities and provinces, according to a survey of the Da Lat City People’s Committee. The committee, however, has reported a boom in online sales of agricultural produce, flowers and botanicals ahead of Tet. It advised farms to use bank transfer payments for retail orders and to sign contracts with merchants for wholesale orders to ensure the success of online deals. Livestreams Shoppers can find various types of flowers from flower farms and merchants on online shopping platforms. Nguyen Thi Bich Thuy from Biofresh Company in Da Lat City has hosted livestreams via Facebook to guide viewers through different types of flowers and plants available on the farm. Amid the pandemic, live commerce has helped promote and sell products, and engaged potential shoppers, Thuy said. Tran Van Tam, a flower grower in Da Lat …
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VIETNAM BUSINESS NEWS FEBRUARY 9
Demand for top meat drives funding Demand for top meat drives funding In the midst of the rising demand for quality pork, Vietnam has witnessed growing investment in the clean meat market. Last week, AVG Capital Partners, a private equity fund from Russia, signed an MoU with Thanh Hoa People’s Committee to develop a $1.4 billion pork processing complex in Nghi Son Economic Zone. With an area of 1,000 hectares, the complex has a designed capacity to produce five million hogs a year. It will boast 43 commercial pig farms and three hybrid pig farms, a mixed feed factory with a capacity of two million tonnes a year, as well as a slaughterhouse and processing plant with a capacity of 600,000 tonnes a year. Phong Quach, head of business development at Ipsos Strategy3 in Vietnam, said that as a general principle, any high-tech investment in agriculture is good for Vietnam. This is because the Vietnamese agricultural sector is still trying to attract more technology that can provide higher output for both the domestic and export markets. The Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development has identified in its objectives for 2030 that it wants to strive for high-value added agricultural outputs rather than volume. Quach added, “When we take a closer look at different points in the value chain and investments, there are different dynamics in the competition depending on the node we review. The latest investment from AVG Capital Partners is a feed-farm-food (3F) investment encompassing the entire production chain. However, the output capacity of the processing facility is much higher than its supply, with 600,000 tonnes of processed meat against five million hogs a year.” This would suggest that there is still significant opportunity for Vietnamese farms to supply this facility. If AVG Capital Partners is looking to source hogs from Vietnamese farms, this would be a vote of confidence for local farming while epidemics still wreak havoc in the global …
Online trade promotion helps businesses adapt to COVID-19
Workers at a garment and textile firm (Photo: VNA) HCM City (VNA) - The spread of COVID-19 around the world created difficulties for businesses in promoting their products and seeking new customers but many were prompted to change trade promotion strategies and adapt. Bui Thi Thanh An, Vice Director of the Trade Promotion Agency at the Ministry of Industry and Trade, said nearly 50 national-level trade promotion programmes were cancelled or postponed last year due to the pandemic. This had a major effect on export activities and the economy in general, she said. To address the situation, the agency has sped up the introduction of information technology (IT) and changed how trade promotion activities are held. Since March when COVID-19 spread globally, the agency has changed all trade promotion activities to online. More than 500 international online trade conferences have now been organised, along with more than 1 million online trade exchanges. These events helped connect more than 2,000 businesses with foreign partners in different markets, An said. Wood processing for exports (Photo: VNA) The agency has also coordinated with foreign customers based in Vietnam, such as AEON and Central Group, to organise special “weeks” featuring Vietnamese products, through which many goods have been selected for sale in foreign-owned supermarket chains around Vietnam and then headed to foreign markets. It has also made use of social networks and Vietnamese trade offices abroad to support businesses seeking markets, An added. Such efforts contributed to maintaining export growth and speeding up economic recovery, while helping enterprises remain updated on market developments, trends, and demand, she added. Though online trade promotions have become more common since the pandemic broke out and were initially considered just a temporary solution, experts and enterprises agree that they will now become a key part of the trade promotion …
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