The man who builds value chain for lemon in Long An province

Mr. Nguyen Van Hien (R), chairman of Chanh Viet Trade and Investment Company, introduces products made from seedless lemon of the company

Hien told that his main job is construction. Once he and some friends came to Ben Luc district and saw the fallow along Highway N2, they bought 30 hectares intending to build a small farm to take a rest at the weekend.

Afterwards, he decided to develop agriculture in the fallow but failed to find a suitable plant. After many times of visiting Southern Fruit Research Institute and Agriculture and Forestry University to get opinions from agricultural experts and learning experiences of farmers in the region, he decided to start with seedless lemon.

Organic farming method in association with export market has been chosen to increase product value.

In 2012, he and fellow-workers built a seedless lemon farming model according to new techniques in Thanh Loi commune, Ben Luc district. A slew of modern machines and lot of workers were mobilized to till the land, dig canals and build concrete road to facilitate production and traffic connectivity to surrounding areas.

The lemon farming area of Chanh Viet Company has reached 150 hectares and its products have been exported under the brand name of CHAVI.

When staring growing seedless lemon trees, Hien and co-workers abided by European technical standards. However that the volume of lemon meeting standards for export account for only 30-40 percent of output under that farming method. If selling the remaining volume in the domestic market, the value would be very low. That prompted Hien to study and take scientists assist to develop lemon products.

Lemon juice is the first product of his company, having been export to Japan. Other products such as beverage, lemon powder and lemon salt have been widely distributed locally and exported to Europe, Middle East and Southeast Asia nations, China and Taiwan (China).

The company has continued working with US Chapman University and Malaysian Universiti Putra to develop products from lemon.

According to Mr. Hien, it is necessary to have a strategy to build value chain from plants towards sustainable farming model to develop agriculture efficiently. Farmers or businesses must link up to scientists to create and improve value chain for agricultural products./.

By Kien Dinh – Translated by Hai Mien