Farmers need training to develop digital agriculture

The Vietnam Digital Agriculture Association launches the first ever report on the country's agriculture in 2021 in Hanoi on July 7 (Photo: VNA)

Farmers need more training on digital technology to bring the industry to another level, experts have said.

Nguyen Duc Tung, general secretary of the Vietnam Digital Agriculture Association (VIDA), made the statement said at a launch ceremony for a report on digital transformation in agriculture in Hanoi on July 7.

“Vietnam has adequate facilities and infrastructure to implement digital transformation in the agricultural sector,” he said, adding that farmers’ technology adaption was among the factors that needed most attention when building digital agriculture.

According to the report, although Vietnam was an agricultural country, Vietnamese agriculture has still not had strong development due to many internal and global problems.

The multi-dimensional impact of the Fourth Industrial Revolution and the COVID-19 pandemic has forced the economy and agriculture to transform, according to the report.

The report said though digital transformation was inevitable and the first results of the change have shown potential, the digital transformation process of agricultural production was still long and full of challenges.

The report considered the e-government programme of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development and other regulations in data sharing as positive points in the process, but the weakness of the system was that agricultural data was not connected from the local to national level while there was a lack of human resources to use technology in farming.

Most agriculture students don’t know much about technology, Tung said.

At the same time, links between enterprises in the value chain and ties those in the chain need to ensure better harmony in terms of benefits and responsibilities, according to the report.

The report said the lack of funding for digital transformation was a problem faced by most businesses, especially small and medium-sized firms, the most common business type in Vietnam.

According to VIDA, the report provides an overview of local agriculture by approaching the core stakeholders of the industry like farmers, businesses and policymakers through online surveys and in-depth face-to-face interviews on the digital transformation process in Vietnam.

VIDA's goal in the coming years is to develop the annual report to become a total solution for the digitisation of the agricultural sector.

Tung said the report is hoped to the premise for the development of business evaluation indicators in the industry.

VIDA’s report also recommended building a common and uniform database, developing infrastructure with the participation of many parties, developing policies to support capital investment for businesses, developing an innovation system focusing on new technology, and promoting awareness through communication.

Despite the COVID-19 pandemic, Vietnam saw a year on year increase of 30.3 percent in agro, forestry and seafood product exports to 22.83 billion USD in the first five months of 2021, reported the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (MARD)./.