Pham Van Chu, the owner of a pig and fowl farm in Ea Nam commune in Dak Lak

The images of farmers carrying water with a shoulder pole or bending down to put manure on crops have disappeared. Now, farmers just need a smartphone to deal with heavy field work, said Pham Van Chu, the owner of a pig and fowl farm in Ea Nam commune in Dak Lak.

Chu, in a suit and polished shoes, showed his smartphone with images of his farm as he sat in Hanoi controlling his farm in Dak Lak.

“With the camera system and remote control system, I can set the temperature and feeding regime of the farm. I can take care of my pigs and fowls thousands of kilometers away,” he said.

Previously, Chu ran his farm the traditional way and used a high number of laborers. He has been applying high technology in farming in the last two years and gained excellent results.

The entire farm, covering 6,000 square meters, is equipped with cameras. One chip is attached to every water trough. When the water runs out, the chip will alert him and he just needs to conduct some operations on his system to make the troughs full of water again.

Previously, to control the temperature, he had to install thermometers at the farm and regularly enter the farm to check the temperature. But this work is now conducted automatically. He checks the temperature with his smartphone.

Chu now uses six workers only, but the farming results are very good. In 2020, he collected VND20 billion from pig and fowl farming alone and made a profit of VND4 billion. He also earned money from tens of thousands of square meters of orchards and fish ponds.

The entire 10 hectare farm of Nguyen Dong Hai, director of VietFarm Co Ltd in Da Lat, is run in accordance with GlobalGAP standards, using high technology.

When sowing seeds, he installs a chip that helps control moisture and nutrition and synchronizes the data with the irrigation system. Any time the crops need water or nutrition, the chip will alert him, and an automatic irrigation system will start.

The data are updated into computer and smartphone, which allows Hai to control the development of crops from anywhere. The data are also updated into the quality control system for product traceability.

The farm has obtained licenses to export products to the European and the US markets. It is also cooperating with MM Mega Market Vietnam to export products to Thailand and Singapore.

“We sell about 40 tons of vegetables to the supermarket chain each month and 600 tons a year with annual revenue of VND10-12 billion,” Hai said.

At VinEco’s 47 hectare farm in Tam Dao, Vinh Phuc province, farmers just measure plants and press buttons on the control board. All the stages from planting to packaging are done by machines to ensure that the plants are 100 percent clean.

A representative of VinEco said the company has 14 vegetable farms all over the country like the one in Tam Dao. Thanks to high technology, farmers can save time and effort. The the yield has improved considerably, 6-8 times higher than the traditional cultivation method. The number of workers can be reduced by 50-70 percent.

Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development Nguyen Xuan Cuong said that digital transformation in agriculture is proceeding rapidly and new farming models bring high economic efficiency.

Farmers now take care of vegetables, fruits, pigs and fowls with their smartphones. Companies are carrying out digital transformation on a large scale. At Nam Viet JSC, for example, hundreds of hectares of farming ponds are equipped with the automatic feeding system. Workers just need to press buttons to feed fish at fixed time.

Selling goods on global market

Many Vietnamese farmers just need to press a button to grow vegetables and raise pigs, and click a mouse to sell vegetables in the global market.

“We will accelerate digital transformation to form a new generation of farmers who can apply digital technology and sell goods online. We can dream of a future digital agriculture as we have enterprises which are very active and dynamic in the transformation process,” Cuong said.

Smartphones in recent years not only have helped Chu and Hai grow vegetables and raise pigs, but also helped Pham Van Khang in Dak Nong sell his farm produce in the global market.

Khang and his wife grow many kinds of crops, from food to industrial crops which bring revenue of VND2 billion a year. In 2020, the time for harvesting 10 hectares of macadamia, the products didn't sell because of Covid-19. However, when they shifted to sell products online, the sales went very well.

Nguyen Thanh Tan, the owner of an eel farm in Vinh Long, has been selling products via social networks for several years. With 99 percent of customers ordering online, Tan provides 12 tons of merchandise to the market each year, worth VND9 billion. 

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