VN, Australia ink letter of intent on agricultural cooperation

Deputy Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development Le Quoc Doanh and Australian Center for International Agricultural Research general manager for country programs Peter Horne ink a letter of intent on cooperation in agricultural research - Photo: VNA

The letter was signed by Deputy Minister of MARD Le Quoc Doanh, and ACIAR’s general manager for country programs Peter Horne on the sidelines of the APEC Food Security Week held in the Mekong city of Can Tho.

Speaking at the event, Mr. Peter Horne welcomed the active participation of Vietnamese partners in the process of establishing a new strategy in the two nations’ relations, thus setting up a future roadmap for the two nations.

He expected that in the next 10 years, the two sides will make contribution and enjoy benefits from a united oriented strategy in cooperative research, geographic focus areas and specific priorities for research programs.

Accordingly, the ACIAR will join hands with the MARD and other partners to seek feasible measures to tackle obstacles in agricultural development in Viet Nam, focusing on food safety, climate change, land quality improvement and crop efficiency, market connection, improvement of value from forests and aquaculture.

Deputy Minister Doanh hoped that Viet Nam will cooperate with ACIAR to find new ways for issues of Viet Nam’s agriculture such as improvement of capacity and quality of agricultural products, protection of land and water resources and guaranty of food safety.

Since 1993, the ACIAR has completed 170 research projects in Viet Nam, worth almost AUD100 million (US$72.9 million).

By Thuy Dung