Part 1: Mrs. Dang and the story of cooperation with Hagimex

     The Project Supporting Enterprises for Development - Supporting Business Enterprises to Create Impacts in the Agricultural Value Chain, or EFD for short, aims to help the disadvantaged (small-scale farmers)  poor women, poor youth) improve their status, get more jobs, increase income, have access to products and services to improve quality of life.

     The perfect storm arrived when the province, which is only an hour drive south from the capital of Hanoi, started to open up for investors and devoted more and its land to factories. "They give jobs that are more stable for the people here." aunt Dang said. "You would not have to worry about the weather or the traders your health any more. So people just left their fields."As aunt Dang and other farmers looked for ways to stick to their land, they stumbled on something promising: a crunchy fruit also known as mini gherkin cucumber, or dua bao tu ("stomach cucumber") in Vietnamese, and a willing buyer sitting 3km from her field, HAGIMEX. "They pay us 11,000 dong a kilogram, which is twice the price of other crops," she said. And the Red River delta soil has proven to nurture the vines so well. The fruits are unfamiliar in the local cuisine, but she heard that once brined and packed in jars, they are widely savoured in colder countries. Last season she earned VND25 million for her two months of hard work ("The company paid us upfront."). At the other end of the chain, cans of her baby cucumbers that the company takes care of are sold on shelves in supermarkets in high end export markets such as South Korea, Australia, Europe and the US.

      By the end of 2020, aunt Dang's business partner, HAGIMEX, was already Vietnam's top-tier exporter of quality agricultural products. Its factory British Retail Consortium, a reputable food certified by the safety certification scheme is recognised around the world, and its material zone has expanded beyond Ha Nam province, to neighbouring Yen Bai and Hoa Binh provinces, covering the yield of over 1,000 farmers. Pickled cucumbers are the company's staple, next to cinnamon and pineapples. But establishing such a well rounded supply chain has not always been a "rose-covered path," said Nguyen Tien Anh, the director. "But there are various small steps we pieced together along the way."

      The 20-day race is usually well-worth it, concluded aunt Dang, who has been working with HAGIMEX since "the first day the plant started operating." It has helped her raise her three children, one of whom has graduated from university, while the two others are in high school. "Other farmer sisters and I prefer working freely, on our land," she said. "At this age, we don't think standing in factories suits us."

Excerpted from “EFD Project- Stories of Change” written by Phuong Nhung