Hiệp Hội Chè Việt Nam - VITAS

PROJECT OVERALL INTRODUCTION

With the purpose of overcoming the current biggest obstacle of Vietnam tea sector – MRL (Maximum Residue Level) exceeding as well as supporting Vietnam Tea producers in terms of latest updates about MRL regulation and other technical barriers in major exporting markets, Vietnam Tea Association, sponsored by IDH organization, associating with Croplife and CBI, have been implementing a project called “Quality and Sustainability of tea industry in Vietnam” (Tea IDH project for short)

IDH project started from September 2015 with the commitment of 13 tea producers from 6 different provinces all over this country with the scale of 3900 farmers, 3900 target ha of tea plantation and 30.000 ton of fresh tea leaves equivalent to 6000 ton of dried products

Overall project objectives: is to make the Vietnam tea production to be compatible to the international standards, through improving the whole value chain that will deliver a high quality tea at a cost effective price, which results in improved benefits for all actors in the chain.

Main activity to support these 13 producers including:

-         Improve the manufacture capacity by assisting factories to upgrade to higher level (B, C to A) according to the assessment system of MARD(Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development) about facilities, food safety and other criteria,  so they are able to produce tea quality that meets the high value market requirements.

-         Apply Agri-team model to help tea producers gain better control of chemicals sprayed in their tea plantation.

+  Establishment of 13 Agri-teams for 13 factories which have collaboration with farmers

+   Training course about proper usage of Agro-chemicals for 13 Agri-teams who are going to be in charge of all spraying activity

+   Updates and experts’ advices for tea producers about MRL regulation from international markets, alternatives to banned chemicals and other related agricultural technique

-         Provide support for tea producers in terms of  PPE, sample testing in global labs and alternative pesticides for trial spraying

-         Promoting tea producers to gain access to international market, and participating in international events and national festivals i.e.

 With non-stop effort, IDH project management board and all participants of this project hopes to achieve these below outcomes:

Outcome 1: Solve successfully the MRL issue of 13 companies with the scale of 3900 farmers, 3900 ha and 30,000 tons of volume equivalent to 6000 dried product.

Outcome 2: Agri-team’s skill about proper usage of Agro-chemicals as well as farmers’ knowledge of other practices such as: production, farm management, harvesting and post-harvest (incl. storage and pre-processing) is improved and as a consequence, yields and quality would be improved

Outcome 3: Global perception of Vietnam tea quality is improved and Vietnam tea producers’ competiveness in major market is increased