GlobalStudy
Program
Cooperative Learning Abroad

2013

Future Agribusiness in Vietnam
Chiba University
Nong Lam UniversityTRhis program aimed to develop proposals
for future types of agribusiness,prepared by teams of students fromecently, much attention has been
given to the so-called “sixth sector(1 x 2 x 3 = 6)” – agricultural workers aredifferent backgrounds, ages and interests.

not only involved in crop production but

The students did not need to possesshave also moved into food processing andspecialized knowledge about agriculture

distribution. For example, some Japaneseor about business, but just be motivatedlocal authorities have found a niche demandto actively participate in the conception ofand have started to supply a high-value

innovative ideas.

added agribusiness service in cooperation
with local farmers. Agricultural fields that

Future Agribusiness
in Vietnam

apply innovative technology could reveal aCT

lot of dormant business chances.

onditions surrounding agriculture
continue to change both in Japanhis program was composed of thefollowing elements: 1) ethnographic

and in Vietnam. For example, in Japan thefieldwork in farms of suburban areas, andnumber of deserted farmlands has been

research in the daily environment andprogressively growing, while the food self–

people’s thinking on agriculture/businesssufficiency rate is constantly decreasing. On

in Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC), Vietnam; 2)

the other hand, Vietnam maintains a highlectures about the present situation andfood self-sufficiency rate and the country’future prospects of Vietnamese agricultures output value in agriculture has been

by Nong Lam University professors; and 3)

increasing. Under the TPP (Trans-Pacificdesign thinking workshops on agribusiness.

Partnership), we will face a new phase ofStudents worked in groups andagriculture and business – TPP will bringcollaboratively proposed new agribusinessnot only a dramatic mixture of domestic

ideas including possible products, services

and international agricultural commodities

and business models.

on our dining table, but also an urgent need
to be competitive in the world through newand creative ways to engage in agribusiness.

1

Schedule
1st week

2nd week

Mon. Arrival at HCMC

Mon. Group work 2Tue. Project Launch, Univ. tour,Tue. Group work 3

Wed. Field research

Wed. Group work 4

Thu. Cultural exchange,Thu. Final presentation

Fri. Field researchFri. City tour (Museum, Market etc.)

Sat. Field research (VegetableSat. Arrival at Narita

Vitamese class and Lecture 1(Clean vegetable farm)

Lecture 2 and Group work 1

and farewell party(Coconut factory)

Departureand cacao farm in the univ.)

Sun. Tour of historical sites

2

W

e began with experiencing
Vietnamese daily life and thedifferences between Vietnamese andJapanese agriculture through field researchand lectures. Students also had a culturalexchange session to introduce their own
culture, food, popular music, university lifeetc. We attended a lecture about problemsof Vietnamese agriculture, which produces
and exports low-value, raw materials,
but imports high-value products. Eating
breakfast, lunch, and dinner locally, andgazing through the window of our tour bus
during our field trips, made us discern alittle more of Vietnam each day.

3F

ield research was one of the mostimportant steps in this project. Students

tried as much as possible to gather "facts"that they saw, heard and felt directly bythemselves. The motorbike is the mostpopular mean of transport in Vietnam; ofcourse the roads in the city center of HCMC
were packed with motorbikes. When theriders stopped at the traffic light, one lady
started to sell daily products, while walking
in the opposite direction of the traffic.. We
also visited a historical place related to theVietnam War, the Mekong River, a factory of
handmade coconut candies, and a villagethat was entirely encircled with water.

4A

ctual fieldwork took place at an organic
vegetable farm and several farms

located within the grounds of Nong Lam
University, and producing cocoa, asparagus,
dragon fruits, eggplant etc. This experience
made students understand the realsituation of agriculture in Vietnam. It was
not mechanized farming, but still managed
by human hands. Vietnamese students fromthe department of agriculture presented
their knowledge to the Japanese and to theother Vietnamese students. We faced strong
sunshine, and a clear blue sky, with someoccasional squall.

5Avariety of field research made students
become aware of many facts thatwere considered usual by the Vietnamesestudents, but had been unheard of in thecase of Chiba University students. These
facts lead to new findings and the real
information which students gathered
through touching, sighting and hearing
were transformed into future possibilities,
foresights for a Vietnam produced out of
the imagination of this younger generation.
HCMC provided a lot of interesting realities:
the large number of motorbikes, theongoing construction of the subway, thehigh value of plastic greenhouses, and theexport of low-value-added products.

6For their preliminary assignment,
students made "material sheets" that

described interesting topics related tothree themes: agribusiness, business andregular life. They found 5 topics for each of
the themes, by searching on the Internet,
magazines and newspapers, and arranged
them in an appealing manner, with a catchy
title, pictures and short descriptions. Thenevery student selected approximately 10
from the total of 150 topics brought in by all
students, and discussed these with his/her
team. These discussions had the objectiveof extracting the reasons why these topics
were deemed interesting enough to beselected. Each group then combined
the different reasons discovered in thediscussions and tried to come up with a new
topic that was based on the combination of
those reasons. In other words, combining
into one topic the reasons, which hadoriginally made distinct topics interesting,
was a task that played the role of triggering
the expansion of ideas beyond individual
powers of imagination.

7

A

lot of proposals were generated by
the crossbreeding of two categoriesof ideas, which had been assembled andidentified through the process described
previously. The first category of ideasincluded aspects related to the present orfuture of Vietnam. The second category
was composed of ideas found aroundthe world and which currently seemextreme, but could become common in
the future. Each student then voted forthe best five ideas using four criteria: his/her own recommendation, social impact,recommendable to one’s family, andfeasibility. Using the number of votes asreference, each team decided on the ideathat they would keep and present at the endof the program. Finally, a business model
canvas was used to help students brush up
and increase the feasibility of their ideas.

8O

ne team presented for example the ideaof a "bus ticket" that could be used as

discount coupon to buy local agriproducts.
This proposal attempted to bring solutions
to two problems faced by Vietnam today:
one was to create the incentive to use
public transport instead of motorbikes (andthus avoid environment pollution), and thesecond was to contribute to the economy oflocal agriculture.

At the end, each team presented
their plan for a future agribusiness

which they had developed throughout
this program. Students were encouraged
to focus on discussing their businessmodel in teams, rather than spendingtime on preparing beautiful powerpoint
presentations. As a result, one common
characteristic of the presentations wasthat handwritten sketches often appeared
several times on the presentation slides.
9Participants
Chiba University
Tsuyoshi FUKIAGE (1)Dream (Team)

Yumi HANDA (3)Dream

Shunsuke KORIKAWA (1)Candy

Taigo KURIYAMA (M1)

BalloonYike LEI (1)Alien

Takuya NAGASAWA (3)Dream

Natsumi OKUMOTO (1)BalloonYusuke OTSUKI (3)BalloonShun SAITO (M2)

Alien

Rika SATO (3)Candy

Kanna YOSHIDA (3)Candy

Nong Lam University

10

Khanh HOANG DUC

BalloonVy HUYNH LE

Alien

Truong HUYNH NHAT

Alien

Thach NGUYEN NGOCDream

Vi NGUYEN TU

Candy

Anh NGUYEN TUYET

DreamHang TRAN NGOC DIEM

Dream

Phuong PHAM MINH

Alien

Manh PHAM NGUYEN

Candy

Thu PHAM THI MINH

Candy

Ngoc VUONG MINHBalloon

GlobalStudy
Program2013

Future Agribusiness in Vietnam11