January 29, 2013

Vietnam aims to boost corn production by 70%

In order to reduce its reliance on corn imports, Vietnam hopes to boost its corn production by nearly 70% to 7.5 million tonnes/year by 2020.

Under the government's corn development strategy until 2020, 1.3 million hectares will be set aside for corn cultivation, yielding an average of 5.8 tonnes/hectare, for a total production of 7.5 million tonnes a year.

"By 2020, domestic corn production in Vietnam would meet 80-85% of demand for corn for livestock feed production," said Pham Van Du, Deputy Director of Crop Production Department. To boost the corn yield, the government is increasing investments in research and development programmes to breed high-yielding corn varieties.