Traders at the Hóc Môn wholesale market in HCM City. Photo baotintuc.vn

 HÀ NỘI — The supply of agricultural products will meet consumer demand for the long term with the support of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development's special working team in HCM City. 

At a meeting between the minister of agriculture and rural development and the special working team, as well as representatives of 13 Mekong Delta provinces on Tuesday, the team said it has connected suppliers to consumption systems to sell 200-400 tonnes of agricultural products each day, mainly including sweet potatoes, bananas, longan, coconut, aquatic products and other kinds of vegetables.

Each province had an average of 30 suppliers gaining successful transactions per day thanks to the connection information of the working team.

Up to now, the working team has gathered 1,166 suppliers and traders of agricultural products and food including vegetables, fruits, aquatic products, livestock and other agricultural products.

The suppliers and traders include cooperatives, households, farms, enterprises and wholesale market management boards.

The team's website connecting supply and consumption for products helps speed up the connection and purchase of agricultural products amid pandemic prevention and control measures in Southern provinces and cities.

In addition, the working team has used Zalo and email networks to send information of suppliers and traders at the Thủ Đức, Bình Điền and Hóc Môn wholesale markets in HCM City. 

The amount of farming produce consumed through the connection of the working team is forecast to continue growing when traders in large wholesale markets in HCM City return to work. 

"It is necessary to have a plan on consumption connections for the whole region, not just a province or city," Nguyễn Sĩ Lâm, Director of the An Giang Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, said at the meeting.

"The People's Committee of An Giang Province regularly holds meetings to remove difficulties in farming produce consumption, and also has set up a hotline with other localities such as Đồng Tháp, Cần Thơ and Kiên Giang to promote the consumption of agricultural products. However, traders still have to move to Mekong Delta provinces to purchase those products, so they need consumption connection in the whole region and all 19 southern provinces that are implementing social distancing," Lâm said.

The working group has recommended that the localities need to create the most favourable conditions for the circulation of essential goods, agricultural products and services for production and consumption, such as seeds, raw materials for animal food production and agricultural equipment.

Trần Thanh Nam, Deputy Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development and head of the special working team, requested that localities should closely monitor agricultural production and consumption to have support for farmers when they face difficulties in production and consumption.

The working team continues to update the list of suppliers and traders for agricultural products. It will review agricultural products with large output under and before the harvesting period and promote the consumption of agricultural products.

Nam said the agriculture and rural development departments of the southern provinces and cities must actively develop detailed plans to adapt to the pandemic, the market and the weather. That aims at ensuring the area and productivity to meet the food demand of each province and the whole region in case of natural disasters and the pandemic.

Besides that, the localities should focus on processing fruit and vegetables and developing production plans next year.

They need to encourage farmers, cooperatives and businesses to promote the consumption of agricultural products on e-commerce platforms such as postmart.vn, voso.vn and https://htx.cooplink.com.vn. They should open selling points to support farmers in consuming agricultural products during the pandemic.

Nam also said that the working team will continue to connect the consumption of agricultural products and pilot a agricultural product trading floor until the end of this year.

"Departments of agriculture and rural development should establish a local agricultural product market management team to coordinate with the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development in promoting the connection in agricultural product consumption," he said. VNS