Some food and beverage products from a cooperative in Ben Tre province attract consumers. (Photo: vnbusiness.vn) Ly Hong Tien, Director of Hau Giang Xanh Cooperative in Hau Giang province,told vnbusiness.vn that thanksto the links her cooperative has established with distributors, itwas completing many orders of processed thatlat fish to serve local demand and that for exports.
According to experts, though economic difficulties would continue in 2023,there remained untapped business opportunities for small firms andcooperatives in the F&B industry.
Experts said that when an economy was unstable, investors intended to return toindustries with high demand as the F&B sector is an essentialindustry.
A recent report by iPOS.vn said that Vietnam had around 338,600restaurants and coffee shops by the end of last year. Last year, the F&Bmarket was worth around 610 trillion VND (26 billion USD).
It also showed that domestic people still favoured independent shopsand restaurants. This was also the primary model that cooperatives andsmall businesses in the industry were developing.
According to representatives of cooperatives with food and beverageoutlets, many consumers preferred this model because the pricesof services, food and drinks here were affordable for most Vietnamesepeople.
They said that many cooperatives in rural areas had also invested inbeverage shops and restaurants to meet people's needs instead of high-pricedchain stores, which were concentrated mainly in first-class urbanareas.
Large enterprises with facilities and factories in urban areas might facedifficulties opening food and beverage shops in the countryside because ofthe high cost of transporting goods. However, this is an advantage forcooperatives as most of them have raw materials available. Experts saidthat with a focus on investing in machinery and promoting links with others,cooperatives could diversify their products and reduce costs.
Do Duy Thanh, F&B director of Horeca Business School, was quoted by vnbusiness.vn as saying that customersbecame pickier in choosing restaurants to suit their tastes.Currently, the newly-established food and beverage stores opened bycooperatives have also tended to develop and shape in their way,creating a distinctive feature.
For example, many cooperatives have opened coffee shopsthat provide customers with coffee produced by themselves. Besidesenjoying coffee, customers could also experience the roasting and grindingcoffee stages meeting OCOP standards, Thanh said, outlininga cooperative that had opened a coffee shop associated with a factoryproducing brocade goods.
Despite their efforts in gradually identifying the needs of the market, inorder for these cooperatives to effectively grasp business opportunitiesamid the difficult economic conditions, experts said they still needed moresupport from the State management agency.
Ngo Van Phi, Director of Dai Minh Agricultural Cooperative in the centralprovince of Quang Nam, outlined insufficient capital as the majorchallenge for many cooperatives to expand their production,seek sources of goods and invest in processing and marketing.However, it was difficult for cooperatives to access loans withpreferential interest rates, which required them to have collateral.
Phi suggested that loans for the collective economic sector should beflexible and diversifying. He also petitioned the authorities to be clear aboutthe rules, regulations and administrative procedures so that cooperatives couldaccess capital sources to speed up production and meet market demand.
Meanwhile, experts said most cooperatives in the F&Bfield had not yet paid attention to applying labour standardsthat were described as a must for cooperatives besides environmentalprotection if they wanted to meet the demand of markets, especially strictexport outlets.
Cooperatives must make long-term plans to gradually improve labourstandards and be ready for more stringent and specific requirements in thefuture. For example, experts suggested that they should invest in humanresource management technology, paying insurance and bonuses for employees tocreate stability in work and affirm the cooperative model's role./.
VNA
