Binh Thuan (VNS/VNA) - The People's Committee of thesouth-central province of Binh Thuan is seeking ways to facilitate thesustainable development of its dragon fruit production chain.

The province targets to improve economic efficiencyfor cooperatives and businesses, while increasing competitiveness andexpanding the fruit's consumption.

At a workshop late last week to connect localenterprises with partners at home and abroad to expand the market fordragon fruit, experts said the province needed to focus on producingorganic dragon fruit and developing a production roadmap to meet the needs ofmarket diversification.

Accordingly, the plan would help expand the green dragon fruitexport market, increase export volume to traditional export markets andenhance trade promotion activities.

At present, Binh Thuan mainly produces fresh dragon fruit, ofwhich 80-85% are for export and about 15-20% are for the domestic market.

Binh Thuan province now encourages farmers to increase productquality in dragon fruit production while not expanding productionareas for the sustainable development of this product.

Nguyen Duc Tri, Deputy Director of the provincial AgriculturalExtension Center, said VietGAP standards are also applied for the sustainabledevelopment of dragon fruit production. That has increased the value of dragonfruit products and met the demand of export markets. On the other hand, the useof pesticides is also minimised, increasing the prestige and quality of BinhThuan dragon fruit products.

By the end of 2022, the area of dragon fruit trees in the provincewas about 26,977 hectares, down 5,283 hectares compared to 2021; productionreached more than 600,000 tonnes. In the period of 2020-2022, the wholeprovince had only 9,063 hectares of dragon fruits that met VietGAPstandards.

Binh Thuan province is forming a dragon fruit production regionwith high technology in the districts of Ham Thuan Nam and Ham Thuan Bac.

The Binh Thuan Department of Agriculture and Rural Development hasalso requested the Sub-Department of Crop Production and Plant Protection andrelevant agencies to strengthen the management and supervision of the use ofplanting region codes and codes of dragon fruit packing establishments thathave been granted to organisations and individuals in the province.

It would also coordinate with the Market Management Department tostrengthen inspection and control of the labelling at dragon fruit packagingfacilities in accordance with existing regulations.

Binh Thuan’s dragon fruit has been exported to 17 countries suchas India, China and Malaysia./.