The Thang Binh cooperative was set up in 2013 from a cooperative group of sugarcane farmers in Dak Lak province of Central Highland Vietnam. Most of the members are immigrants from Quang Nam – a Central coastal province - to Central Highland in the wave of New Economic Zones in 1980s. They named this cooperative Thang Binh as a way to remind of their homeland (Thang Binh district). Thang Binh has started working with Agriterra since 2018.
For years Thang Binh cooperative provides raw sugarcane based on farming contracts to several sugar mill companies in Dak Lak from their 400 ha of sugarcane. In addition, they also collect and resell rice from 165 ha of rice from their members. The sugarcane contracts ensure stable incomes for their members even the sugar price has been quite fluctuated recently. However, in order to be more sustainable and reduce the risks, Thang Binh decided that they cannot be too much dependent on a single commodity and need to look for other means of business.
“We discussed with our members and it is obvious that we have a huge potential on rice with high quality from the best rice seeds. However, now we only collect and sell raw grains while there is an increasing demand with better price if we can meet some standards such as the right amount of moisture in grains” – shared by one of board members.
There was a bit of delay by Covid-19 on shortage of construction workers but finally on 15 April 2020 the processing unit was finally launched.
With the consensus and support from members, the cooperative has started their plan since June 2019 to build up a processing facility for rice drying process. A solid plan was made. The cooperative was presenting the investment plan and required budget to members and looking up for different means of capitalisation. Other team of technicians took a trip to Mekong delta region – “Rice Bowl” of Vietnam – to survey the processing and milling technologies and find potential suppliers. The newly-established Youth Farmer Groups sent their members to trainings on how to operate and manage processing facility.
There was a bit of delay by Covid-19 on shortage of construction workers but finally on 15 April 2020 the processing unit on an area of 660 m2 with capacity of 20 tons of rice per day was finally launched. On the first day, 18 tons of rice had been processed with the moisture rate in grains of 14%. A big agricultural company – Vinaseed – has approached and signed an agreement with Thang Binh to collect processed rice.
“This is very first step. We still have a lot to do. We need to ceaselessly look for ways to improve quality by introducing and following good practices. We need to find more buyers and suppliers. But a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single steps”, said Mr. Son – director of cooperative – when the first shift of processing unit was done.
Le Ngoc Dung, business advisor in Vietnam