Bac Ninh (VNA) – The northern province of Bac Ninh has set a targetof raising the proportion of hi-tech agriculture in the province’s totalagricultural output value to 35 – 40% by 2025, with the awareness that hi-techagriculture is the inevitable direction of agricultural development.

Torealise this goal, Bac Ninh is rolling out a series of measures to attractresources for sustainable development of hi-tech agriculture.

The hi-tech production model at the LiemAnh Hi-tech Organic Agriculture Cooperative in Viet Doan commune, Tien Dudistrict, is a dream of many farmers. The cooperative, with director NguyenThanh Liem at its lead, generate around 1 billion VND (41,135 USD) in profiteach year. The success is attributable to Liem’s resolve to study and apply scientific-technologicaladvances to production.

Liem graduated university with a degree in biology technology and got a job ata clean food in Hanoi to gain experience. He realized that farmers mostly usetraditional farming techniques and rely on experience. As a result, productionvalue is low and products do not meet food safety standards. In 2015, hedecided to quit his job and return to the home village to start his ownbusiness in clean agriculture production.    

He started by upgrading his family’s dairy farm on 1.3 ha of land, dividing itinto three zones, one for raising fish and storing water for irrigation, pensfor raising cattle and chicken, and the biggest zone for growing vegetable.

In 2017, Liem built more than 700 sq.m of net house to growtomato, cucumber and fruits using modern technology, which generated totalvalue five-fold that of rice cultivation.

Encouragedby the initial success, he and seven other households in the communeestablished the Liem Anh Hi-tech Organic Agriculture Cooperative with a totalland area of 5 ha. They began to grow several varieties of grape, and now thecooperative has 3,500 sq.m of land under grape.

Liem said cooperatives help improve farmers’ income and alsoaddress the dilemma of bumper harvest resulting in lower prices faced byhouseholds engaging in small-scale production.

Accordingto him, the cooperative will continue to improve product quality whileexpanding its farming area. It will transfer farming technology to localfarmers in order to create a sustainable production and sale chain.

BesidesLiem’s cooperative, there are also many hi-tech agricultural models in Bac Ninh.The provincial Department of Agriculture and Rural Development said there are72 hi-tech farms with total acreage of 160 ha, many of which generate incomesranging from hundreds of millions to billions of VND each year.

Thedepartment’s director, Dang Tran Trung said for a province with small naturalarea and big population in a convenient location like Bac Ninh, it is an urgentneed to develop hi-tech agriculture./.