Vietnamese farmer searches tourist

Thursday, February 7, 2008

Agro-tourism in the south east of Asia… It sounds like a logical step, there are many tourist attracts, the farmers are good organised and the tourism-sector is growing. But to connect the farmers with tourist, is not that easy.

Mascha Middelbeek, liaison officer of Agriterra, visited the fields in Vietnam at the end of 2007 to talk to Colecto about the progress concerning a agro-tourism start. Colecto is the business unit of the national farmer organisation. “The conception agro-tourism is hard to explain to the farmers”, tells Mascha. “People are thinking about luxurious resorts for tourists, therefore it’s important to let the farmers and agriculture know that they are the most important thing in this conception”.

And it’s bound to begin. There are plans enough after the first stock-taking in Vietnam, the second one is now proceeding. During the first fase of the project the advance wasn’t as it should be. This has various reasons, a shortage of enterprise and several visions on the project on what’s the most important. In a workshop with the VNFU, Colecto and SNV (Dutch development project) agreed how to precede the second fase. An important point of interest for 2008 is the working of an enterprise within Colecto. “For Colecto is the tourism brand new, we’ve underestimate that in the beginning”. In spite of the focus on the enterprise, we need to help the involved persons. We can teach them a lot about product development and marketing.

The tourism concept that Colecto is offering is called “sleeping at the farm”. Tourist discover the real Vietnam by staying at the farm and share a meal with them. Personal contact, that’s the spirit! The agriculture has also an important place within the agro-tourism. Tourism can see the agriculture-activities and products for example tea and rice tour.

There’s agreed with SNV that the agro-tourism should develop and that this will happen when Agriterra and SNV work more prominent with each other. To work better and more intensive is a central point. SNV has tourism-experts in the countries. They can help and support farmers in the tourism development. Agriterra and SNV will shortly discuss the other tourism possibilities in Asia.

Karin Kraaijvanger
Agriterra news editor