Vietnam Forestry Vision by 2020

Vietnam’s forest sector has not only created forest commodities and services, contributing to the national economy, but also played a role in protection, environmental protection and employment, contributing to national security.

Aiming to promote strengths of forests, meet requirements for renovation and international integration and turn Vietnam into a modernized and industrialized country by the year 2020 as prescribed by the Resolution of the X th Party Congress, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development has elaborated the National Forest Strategy for the period 2006 – 2020 as background for long-term development vision.

Forest sector current status

Vietnam has an area of 33.12 million ha of natural land, including 12.61 million ha forested area and 6.16 million ha bare land. Forest area is mainly distributed in mountainous and hilly areas throughout the country where 25 million people including many ethnic minorities are living. The forest use and management has not yet sustainable, therefore forest area and quality over recent years have been consecutively decreased.

According to statistics, Vietnam had 14.3 million ha forest area with the forest coverage 43% in 1943. By the year 1990, there was only 9.18 million ha left with the forest cover of 27.2%, for the period 1980-1990, on average,  more than 100 thousand ha forest have been lost every year. However, since 1990, the forest area has continuously increased thanks to forest planting operations and natural forest rehabilitation. However, the Central Highland and Southeast Region is still decreasing. Under the Decision 1970/QD/BNN-KL-LN dated 6 July 2006, the whole country’s total forest area was 12.61 million ha as of 31 December 2005 (37% forest cover), including 10.28 million ha of natural forest and 2.33 million ha of plantation. The total forest stock is 813.3 million m³ inclusive of 94% of natural forests and 6% of plantations make up by 6% and about 8.5 billion bamboo and neohouzeauna trees. The average volume of natural forests is 76.5 m³/ha while that of plantations is 40.6m³/ha.

With the above-mentioned forest resource, the average current quotas is 0.15 ha forest/person and 9.16m³ timber/person, relatively lower than the world’s figure of 0.97ha/person and 75m³/person respectively. The total area of un-used land is 6.76 million ha, including 6.16 million ha of bare land and denuded hills, occupying 18.59% of the total natural land area, which is mostly sloppy land and infertile land scatteredly distributed in isolated and remote areas.

At present, the whole country’s forest protection and development has remarkably progressed, preventing from the forest depletion. The forest area has increased to 11.31 million ha in 2000 and 12.61 million ha in 2005 from 9.3 million ha in 1995 (on average increasing by 0.3 million ha/year). The area of new plantations increased from 50.000 ha/year to 200,000ha/year. The area of natural forests which is fast regenerated and rehabilitated has remarkably improved the capacity of forest protection and biodiversity conservation. The harvest volume of plantation timber increased approximately 2,000,000 m³/year, partially supplying raw material for the paper-making industry, mining industry and for particle board for export and fuel wood, contributing to relieving the pressure over natural forests.

The timber and forest product processing industry has dramatically developed. Timber export turnover rose from 61 million USD in 1996 to US$1,034 million and US$1,570 million in 2004 and 2005 respectively, contributing to the whole country’s export turnover. The forest sector has actively involved in generating job opportunities and increasing people’s income, especially ethnic minorities’ and meeting almost demands for furniture and fuel wood consumption.

Although forest area has increased, the quality and biodiversity of natural forests still continuously decreased in many areas. Illegal logging still happens in some forest areas. The forest sector’s growth remains poor and unsustainable due to low profitability, poor competitiveness and properly un-exploited forest potential, especially targeted at non-timber forest products and environmental services. These two sectors can only meet trivial demands for the socio-economic development                    

Forestry development vision 2020

The overall objectives are to establish, manage, protect, develop and use 16.24 million ha land planned for forestry development in a sustainable manner; increase the forest cover to 42-43% and 47% by the year 2010 and 2020 respectively; ensure the further participation of different economic sectors and social organizations involved in forestry activities aiming to further contribute to the socio-economic development; protect ecological environment and biodiversity; improve rural mountainous people’s living standards; and ensure the national security and defense;

Specific duties of the forest sector:

- Establish, manage, protect, develop and use three forest types in a sustainable manner; well manage existing natural forests, increase area and yield of plantations; promote combined agro-forestry production modes and effectively use bare land and denuded hills suitable for forestry development; produce and process competitive and sustainable timber and non-timber forest products (NTFP) in order to meet basic demands for domestic consumption and timber and other forest product exports.

- Create additional two million job opportunities for the forest sector including the timber and NTFP processing industry and handicraft industry; improve incomes and contribute to poverty reduction and decrease by 70% of poor households in key forest areas; finalize forest and forest land lease and allocation to organizations, enterprises, households and individuals and communities before year 2010; increase the number of well-trained forest workers to 50%; target at ethnic minority households, poor households and women living in remote and isolated areas.

- Protect forests and conserve natural resources and biodiversity aiming to effectively perform protection functions of the forest sector, i.e., watershed protection, coastal protection, urban environmental protection, natural disaster mitigation, anti-landslide, water resource conservation, habitat protection, income generation for the forest sector from environmental services;

Based on classification criteria on protection and special-use forests, re-classification of forest types and proper forest land areas: 5.68 million ha of national protection forest; 2.16 million ha of national special-use forest and 8.4 million ha of production forest;

- Manage the total area of 16.24 million ha forest and forest land by all means of establishing permanent national forest estate, compartments, sub-compartments and lots on maps and on site.

- Consider forest protection as the same as conservation of a developed ecosystem, at the same time ensure the capacity to rehabilitate and make the best use of forests and comply with the principle of forest development for the sake of forest protection;

- Develop three forest types (special-use, protection and production), combine conservation/protection with eco-tourism development and other environmental services

- Exploit and use forest resources in a proper and sustainable manner, increase the commercial rate of timber using for harvest and forest product processing;

Implementing solutions

Forestry policy and legislation: it is required to set up a legal framework for establishing a sustainable national forest estate; revise and complete the policy on forest and forest land allocation and lease; formulate policy on environmental service fees in an attempt to encourage economic sectors to involve in forest protection and development, ensuring satisfactory benefits for forest owners.

- Create a capital investment mechanism typical for the forest sector; ensure all economic sectors involved in forest production have access to and win long-term loans suitable for the forest tree business;

- Renovate the organizational structure of the forest sector, mainstream administrative reform into international integration; 1^st prioritize the establishment of forestry administration institutions and enhancement of forestry officials in districts and communes with forest cover in the 5 coming years.

- Encourage and support the foundation of forestry producer’s/trader’s unions and associations, forest and forest product processors and exporters;

- Set up forestry extension organizations ranging from the central level to the provincial and district levels with high forest cover under control of the all-level agriculture extension system;

- Speed up the equitization of forestry state-owned enterprises; re-structure on-going efficient entities into small and medium-sized forestry state-owned companies specialized in diversified production and business in combination with the processing industry and forest product trade in the regions having the centralized forest land areas.

- Organize the implementation of planning/plan for forest protection and development at all levels as well as in forestry units and communities; integrate the planning with the local socio-economic development plans; replace low yield plantations; enhance M&E, forest inventory and monitoring of forest resource developments; consolidate the information system in order to meet requirements forestry system administration and international integration.

- Organize and up-date database to manage forest resources, apply advanced technologies aiming to improve the quality of forest planning and inventory

Forestry technology and science studies are required to meet requirements for production and markets and requested to have forest owners’ and enterprises’ involvement.

- Revise, develop and complete technical procedures and norms; establish a national standard system for sustainable forest management, develop a set of national standards for timber products and non-timber forest products;

- Implement the forest seedling strategy 2006-2020; firstly meet the demands for high quality seedlings serving the planting operation under the Project 661 and other programs/projects.

- Implement the National Plan for Non Timber Forest Products Conservation and Development for the period 2006 – 2020

- Encourage studies and use new alternative materials to replace wood and fuel wood in order to relieve the pressure over forests.

- Build up capacity for forestry workers at all levels, especially in communes and remote and isolated areas in order to meet requirements for sector renovation and international integration; provide training course for staff and well-skilled workers for forest product processing and production firms, forestry farms and handicraft villages.

- Promote international economic integration in the forest sector, dynamic participation and close cooperation with international, regional and bilateral forestry organizations, and further mobilize and effectively use capital sources;

Therefore, Vietnam’s forest sector is managing and organizing production activities on the largest land area compared to the other economic sector. Benefits from the forest sectors are quite considerable in terms of economic, social and environmental aspects. Vietnam is required to make adequate investment in order to develop the forest sector under current new context.

Vietnam’s aloes wood

Aloes wood is the most rare and precious species in Vietnam. People have exploited and used aloes wood for thousands years, especially in late XX^th century. So far aloes wood  is still considered a high economic value and special forest product.

Aloes wood in Vietnam is a kind of oil-infected aromatic timber from Do Bau tree (Aquilaria crassna). Its typical characteristic is of special fragrance when it is burned or not yet burned. When its essential oil is more than 25%, it can be sunk into water. High quality aloes wood can contain 60-80% essential oil. Conditional on the oil-infected content, color, smell, form, weight and origin, aloes wood   is called with different names, for instance, best quality aloes wood is called “ky nam”, 2^nd ranking quality aloes wood  is called “tram” and the 3^rd rank is called “toc”

Aloes wood is a raw material whose provenance is from rare and precious medical herbs, useful for the cosmetics production industry, oriental medical treatment, pharmaceutical production, incense-making industry. The demand for aloes wood is increasingly higher.

It is likely that Do Bau tree generating aloes wood is an indigenous species which is widely distributed in all mountainous areas in Vietnam, mainly in the mountainous Northern Central Region, Central Midland Region, Southern Central Region, Central Highland, Phu Quoc Island of Kien Giang province and Bay Nui of An Giang province. “Ky nam” which is the best quality aloes wood in Vietnam can be found in certain areas in Kon Tum, Dak Lak, Khanh Hoa and Lam Dong provinces. “Tram” and “ky nam” are rarely found on the same Do Bau tree. Since aloes wood is rare and precious as such, local people started developing such Do bau tree in order to produce and generate aloes wood  for export.

The plantation of Do Bau trees is popular all over the country, especially in the Central Region, South-East Region and the Central Highland. Scattered trees planting, mixed stand planting and industrial and pure stand planting are popular current models and planting methods;

There also exist Do Bau forest planting operation modes like cooperation between households and enterprises and minor projects for planting Do Bau for aloes wood processing and export.

Do Bau and Do Me are currently popular species which are grown by means of sowing seeds. The supply of seeds comes from parent Do Bau trees left in natural forests and from some trees grown in 1980s and 1990s of the XX th Century.

Existing methods to produce aloes wood applied in Viet nam:

The hurting method, biological method and chemical method are applied to Do Bau trees which have at least 5 years growing and stem diameter of 15-20 cm

The combination of some of the above-mentioned methods is also considered other method of aloes wood production. There exist some other methods of aloes wood production. However the technology transfer has not yet disseminated to local people. Different methods bring in different quantity, quality, duration and costs. However, it is certain that Vietnamese people have been able to produce aloes wood from Do Bau tree (Aquilaria crassna). The first step to produce aloes wood is to separate oil-infected timber from non-oil timber using simple instruments and manual labor.

Products are pieces and panel of aloes wood.

The method of traditional and manual distillation is mainly adopted to produce aloes wood essential oil. Main product is essential oil and byproducts are usually used for making incense.

Aloes wood -essential oil-making establishments are presently located in Ha Tinh, Hue, Quang Nam, Binh Dinh and Ho Chi Minh city. However their production is not high, only dozens of liters per year. Furthermore, their essential oil quality is not yet high. Therefore, the price fluctuates only US$ 5,000-9,000/liter FOB.

The trade market for man-made aloes wood including piece of aloes wood, aloes wood bonsai  and essential oil is mostly busy in Ho Chi Minh city.

The high commercial value is a direct motivation to speed up investment in this production. When a hectare of Do Bau tree which produce aloes wood may be valued at 1.5 - 1.8 billion VND after 10 years. There exist potential markets for aloes wood products since the demand is increasingly higher. The scarcity of natural aloes wood caused increasingly higher price. This is really useful for the man-made aloes wood production. Especially Do Bau tree (Aquilaria crassna) species which generate a large volume of high quality aloes wood can be found only in Vietnam and some countries like Cambodia and Lao. This is a very crucial comparative advantage.

Apart from the prospect of aloes wood production, there also exist the following challenges:

Vietnam has not yet developed specific strategy for Do Bau trees. The Decree 18/HDBT dated 17 January 1992 by the Ministerial Council considers Do Bau (Aquilaria crassna) as one of special plant species with special scientific and economic values, but with limited quantity and stock and as endangered species. The Decree enforces a ban on exploitation and use whilst it encourages and supports all organizations and individuals to protect and develop these precious sources. In 2005, MARD officially introduced Do Bau into the list of species for production forest operation in 6 out of 9 forest ecosystems (the Decision 16QD/BNN).

The cycle of Do Bau plantation for aloes wood is about 10 years. Investment capital is large; therefore, local people can not grow Do Bau tree without the State’s capital support policy. Furthermore, products are not yet essential products for daily life.

And aloes wood production is the key stage but not received in-depth studies and scientific experiments. Therefore, it has not yet created a high volume and high quality aloes wood. Thus, products are usually used as raw material to create aloes wood bonsai or produce aromatic powder and essential oil.

Vietnam’s aloes wood is a very precious and rare forest product. Conservation and development of specially-valued Do Bau tree species are very imperative. Vietnam’s man-made aloes wood production is very alien. Challenges and opportunities are awaiting big investors. 

POULTRY DEVELOPMENT POLICY FOR THE PERIOD 2007 – 2015

Under the context where Vietnam is facing many difficulties in poultry breeding due to spreading bird flu. The Animal Husbandry Department under the control of MARD has formulated a policy on poultry development throughout the country.

This policy aims to fast shift the existing small-scaled, fragmented and inefficient poultry-raising farms into high yield industrialized farms; move commodity animal husbandry to the midland; decrease the number of smallholder animal husbandry in the densely-populated central plains. This Policy also helps prevent and control the bird flu for the year 2008-2009 and stops this epidemic by the year 2010-2015; successfully develop the processing and slaughtering industry in order to supply safe and clean food products to local people, increase the value of poultry products and develop sustainable markets.

Aiming to attain the above-mentioned overall objective, the following specific objectives have been clarified:

Animal husbandry: the percentage of poultry meat production (including chickens and water-birds) is expected to reach 28% by 2010 and 32% by 2015 out of the total production of all kinds of meat; the chicken production is anticipated to occupy 82% by 2010 and 88% by 2015 out of the total herd of poultry (since duck-raising is decreasing).

The poultry industry’s growth is anticipated as follows:

+ Period 2007 – 2010: the increase of poultry herd is 7.8%/year and in meat production is 21.9%. In 2010, the quantity of fowl is 233 million units by 2010 and meat production is 1.188 thousand tons and egg production is 6.766 million units.  

+ Period 2011 – 2015, the increase of poultry herd is expected to be 8.5%/year and meat production increase by 10.9%. In 2015, the number of chickens is expected to be 350 million units by the year 2015 and meat production is estimated to be 1,992 thousand tons and egg production is expected to be 9,236 million units

Regarding slaughtering and processing: it is required to encourage economic sectors to make investment in slaughter houses and processing establishments aiming to supply safe products and food and increase the value of animal husbandry. By the year 2010, the whole country has 123 slaughtering houses with the capacity of 230 million units, reaching 30% compared to the poultry production availability, by the year 2015, the whole country is expected to have 170 slaughter houses with the capacity of 385 million units, reaching 35% of the production achieved.

Technical solutions are as bellows:

- it is required to promptly shift the existing small-scaled, fragmented and inefficient poultry-raising farms into high yield industrialized farms; move commodity animal husbandry to the midland; smallholder poultry-raising farms in the midland and mountainous areas shall be fenced. Free grazing is not allowed in order to ensure biological safety; limit smallholder animal husbandry in densely-populated plains.

- it is advised to apply advanced technology into animal husbandry; adopt a chain of custody for livestock husbandry; use advanced self-contained coop and automatic trough; encourage using industrial poultry food for smallholder animal husbandry in an attempt to increase productivity and efficiency;

Investment in creating some indigenous breeds with high quality meat and eggs. Indigenous breeds like Ri, Ho and H’mong produce high quality meat and eggs and have strong resistance against harsh conditions and diseases. They are precious genes which need to be invested in breed selection and creation aiming to increase the productivity and use to cross-breed with other breed in order to improve the yield and create high yield cross-bred breed for production scale-up

Veterinary service improvement: compulsory vaccination against dangerous infectious diseases, especially bird flu vaccines under the Decision 63/2005/QD-BNN dated 13 October 2005 by Minister of MARD. It is required widely disseminate veterinary services to farmers in order to help them understand and take phytosanitory measures in their livestock industry, regularly pasteurize and wash hen-coop and surrounding environment. It is advised to socialize the veterinary services in order to mobilize many professional experts to involve in vaccination and disease control; check and inspect into raising farms, markets, slaughter houses and processing establishments in order to ensure biological security and food safety.

It is supposed to make planning and investment in wholesale and retail poultry markets in areas adjacent to big cities.

Regarding land and planning policies: Localities need to make planning for centralized poultry-rearing areas, slaughter houses and processing; deal with procedures for land compensation, land use right revoke and land conversion in order to allocate or lease land to organizations and individuals under capital construction investment projects for industrialized and centralized poultry breeding.

Investment and Incentive Investment Policies: the State has used their budget for investment support to infrastructure construction like transport roads, electric system and water drainage system in the industrialized and centralized raising farms.

Credit policies: the State borrows soft loans (ODA) from international organizations and foreign countries to invest in renovating the poultry production industry, slaughtering and processing industries. The Government is requested to promulgate the revised Decree 106/2004/ND-Cp by the Government dated 1 April 2004 on Development State Credit enabling the farm-scaled poultry production sector, the slaughter and processing industries to make access to development credit loans from the Development Support Fund in order to create investment source, develop and renovate the poultry production sector, processing and slaughtering industries.

Support policies on poultry production sector: aiming to develop the poultry slaughtering and processing industry, the Prime Minister has issued the Decision 395/QD-TTg dated 13 March 2006 on incentive policy targeted at the poultry production, the industrialized and centralized slaughtering and processing industries. Fundamental favorable conditions include preferential taxes and land rental and subsidies on occupation change, 40% interest rate subsidy to investment capital. Localities are requested to specify the Government’s Policy to help local people to make access to this subsidy. The Government is requested to prolong the enforcement of the Decision 394/QD/TTg by the year 2010. The grassroots levels are asked to base on the Circular 42/2006/TT-BNN dated 1 June 2006 by MARD to implement activities at the local level

Market solutions: it is forbidden to trade and slaughter alive poultry in cities, towns and densely-populated residential areas. Localities are required to strictly implement the Decision 3065/QD-BNN-NN dated 7 November 2005 by MARD regulating animal husbandry conditions, incubation, transport and slaughter and trade of poultry products and the Decision 87/2005/QD-BNN dated 21 December 2005 on animal slaughter control procedures. And at the same time, it is required to enhance check and keep quarantine trade markets, slaughter houses and processing establishments in order to ensure food safety; it is supposed to strictly control the poultry smuggling and intermediately destroy and seriously punish illegal poultry imports through borders.

The above-mentioned objectives, solutions and policies on poultry development for the period 2007 - 2015 is absolutely conform to the requirements for animal husbandry development under Vietnam’s new context. Poultry production is highly efficient only by all means of making planning for breeding farms, trade markets, processing units and slaughter houses, well treating environment and avoid diseases and integrate the fowl raising sector into the world market.