Spreading creativity in production

	Fishery industry strives to boost post COVID-19 production
	Government examines ways to revive production
	Covid-19 epidemic dragging production output down

Producing dragon fruit bread at ABC Company Photo: collected

Breakthrough product

In early May, Vietnam Wakamono Joint Stock Company announced information on antibacterial fabric that applied Nano Biotech technology to produce medical masks and labour protective gear, replacing imported goods. .

This product has been patented by the Company since January 2020 and has been marketed since March. Phan Quoc Cong, Chairman of Wakamono Vietnam Joint Stock Company, said that the fabric was able to kill99.9% of bacteria, maintaining antibacterial effect in the long run and safely. The product has been tested and certified for quality by national and international testing agencies. Currently, the factory located in the high-tech park of Wakamono Company with a production capacity of about 20 tonnes of this fabric every day and has run at full capacity. However, the company can also increase its capacity to 50 tonnes per day. Some partners in Thailand, South Africa, the Philippines and South Korea have bought products, but according to Cong, the company currently focuses on supplying to Vietnamese textile and garment manufacturing enterprises and medical labour protective gear manufacturing enterprises. 20 Vietnamese enterprises are ordering and producing masks from this antibacterial fabric of Wakamono.

Vietnam's production of medical masks and protective equipment is heavily dependent on Chinese material supplies. As for medical masks only, according to the Ministry of Industry and Trade, the two main raw materials for manufacturing medical masks are nonwoven and antibacterial fabrics. Of which, the country has produced non-woven fabric and may increase production but not much in the future. As for antibacterial fabric, Vietnam now has to import about 70% from China, the remaining 30% is imported from India, Malaysia, Indonesia, Egypt, South Korea, Japan and Europe.

However, due to the impact of the pandemic and the increasing demand for masks and medical protective gear, the price of material for manufacturing masks in Vietnam has increased rapidly, in some places up to 60-70% compared to before Tet. High prices make Vietnam's face masks and medical protective products face great competition from China and other countries with textile and garment strengths.

For antibacterial fabric with prices at least 30% lower than imported goods, Wakamono's initiative not only meets domestic demand but also contributes to supporting Vietnam's textile enterprises to increase export competitiveness (about price and quality of input materials), and contribute to solving production and employment problems for workers affected by the pandemic.

In addition,Veritas Shoes Vietnam Joint Stock Company (HCMCity) has taken the initiative to produceandlaunch coffee mask product that surprised many people. This product of the company has been exported to Japan, the US and European countries.

Spread the creativity

Not only high-tech enterprises, Ly Kim Chi, Chairman of Ho Chi Minh City Food Association, said that in the difficult situation of the Covid-19 pandemic, many food enterprises had initiatives or created spreading for other enterprises to conduct research and create new products using domestic materials, contributing to adding value to local agriculture.

One of the typical creations is the production of bread from dragon fruits of A Chau Confectionery One Member Limited Company (ABC). Faced with congested dragon fruit due to being unable to export to the Chinese market, in just three days, Kao Sieu Luc, the owner of the ABC bakery brand, together with his staff, finished a trial of the red dragon fruit bread recipe which launched to the market to help the farmers. Not stopping the creativity, a few days after the "fever” of dragon fruit bread in HCM City, Luc continued to launch dragon fruit products with durianRi6.With four times higher price but dragon fruit bread with durian is still very popular with consumers.

From the fever ofdragon fruit bread "rescuing" agricultural products, many enterprises have researched to create many products of vermicelli, rice paper, “pho” and noodles combining vegetables. Duy Anh Food Import Export Co., Ltd (Duy Anh Food) has produced carrot, beetroot, dragon fruit, spinach, black sesame, moringa vermicelli and pea flower vermicelli exported to many European countries, the US, Korea and Japan. In addition to "rescue" watermelon and dragon fruit, this enterprise has also researched making dragon fruit noodles and watermelon vermicelli.

Similarly, Vietnam Wheat Industry Corporation (Vikybomi) has launched wheat flour in combination with agricultural products in need of "rescue" in the season of dragon fruit and watermelon. Not only supporting the consumption of agricultural products, these new products have helped enterprises offset the decline in production productivity and sales from export activities due to the impact of the Covid-19pandemic.

“The creative ideas and efforts of food enterprises in the past time not only removed difficulties for production activities of enterprises in the situation of disease impacts but also contributed significantly to ensure abundant essential products for anti-pandemic work not only for HCM City but also for the whole country,”Ly Kim Chi said.