HCM City (VNA)- Vietnamese food producers need to focus on improving product quality, investin new technologies and build brands to meet consumer demand and increaseexport value, experts said at the Vietnam Food Forum held in HCM City onNovember 16.

With consumers increasingly concerned about product hygiene and food safety,more attention should be paid to the food chain’s different stages, wherehazards can occur, according to Nguyen Song Ha, assistant chief representativeof the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) of the UN.

Good Agricultural Practices (GAP) should be applied to improve safety andquality, he said.

“Vietnamese businesses should invest more in GAP to enable our products to bemore delicious and safer so as to improve our position in the world market,” Hasaid.

The volume of VietGap-certified products remains modest compared to marketdemand, he added.

According to FAO’s forecast, consumption of high-quality food products willincrease significantly until 2020, Ha noted.

Speaking on the sidelines of the forum, Nguyen Huong Quynh, managing directorof  Nielsen Vietnam, said consumers were willing to pay for high-quality,prestigious products.

“Vietnamese food producers have paid a lot of attention to export markets andare selling products that they have, but haven’t focused on what consumersreally need,” she said.

Businesses should not forget that the domestic market has great potential andthat many foreign players want to jump in, she added.

Quynh suggested that they focus more on domestic consumer demand, developsuitable products and improve their technology and product designs.

Speaking at the forum, Do Thang Hai, Deputy Minister of Industry and Trade,said the food industry had greatly contributed to export revenue, creating jobsand improving workers’ incomes.

Export of agricultural and food products were worth 29.6 billion USD last year,a year-on-year increase of 12.7 percent. But 90 percent of Vietnamese farm exportsare raw products, with low added value.

Leon Trujillo, an expert in branding, said: “Vietnam has become a foodproduction powerhouse, but not every country is aware of this.”

He urged Vietnam’s food sector to develop a brand identity that brings value toproducts, the country and its food producers.

More investment in technologies is needed to raise the ratio of processedproducts, delegates said, adding that more research and development wasnecessary to increase competitiveness and add more value to products.

Nguyen Trung Anh, R&D director of the PAN Group, said the company haddeveloped a farm-food-family closed value chain to
offer trusted and traceable products.

It has also worked with local and foreign partners to transfer technologies,develop new products and automate production.

In addition, it has invested in R&D and built linkages with farmers todevelop its own material sources, he said.

Deputy Minister Hai said the Ministry of Industry and Trade in collaborationwith ministries, business associations and companies are implementing measuresto develop markets, improve quality and build brands for Vietnamese foodproducts to gradually raise the export value of products.

At the forum, the Vietnam Trade Promotion Agency (Vietrade) signed a memorandumof understanding with the Hong Kong Trade Development Council for cooperationin trade promotion between Hong Kong and Vietnamese businesses.

Vietrade also signed an MoU with Nielsen Vietnam for cooperation in marketresearch and development.

At the event, Jocelyn Tran, from Walmart, also described how companies couldbecome suppliers to Walmart.

The forum included a business-to-business meeting between Vietnamese producersand foreign importing groups from France, the US, Italy, Japan and China, aswell as local and foreign supermarkets and hypermarkets such as Walmart, CJGroup, Lotte, Central Group, Vinmart and Satra.

Held on the sidelines of the Vietnam Foodexpo, the forum was organised byVietrade, the FAO and VPBank.-VNA