Connecting and consuming products from ethnic minority and mountainous areas through e-commerce platforms is only limit ed to promotion, and the sales value is still low. Photo: H.D

Technology is limit ed

According to experts, in recent times, ministries, branches, localities and e-commerce channels have supported thousands of businesses in accessing goods distribution methods via e-commerce. Thanks to that, many local specialty products in general and products of ethnic minority people in mountainous areas in particular are promoted for consumption.

However, there are many products that haven’t been accessed to these modern business platforms. At the same time, connecting and consuming products from ethnic minority and mountainous areas through e-commerce platforms is only limit ed to promotion, the sales value is low.

Information at the recent seminar "Increasing e-commerce channels, consuming products in ethnic minority and mountainous areas", Mr. Nguyen An Son, Head of Project Development Department, Center for Informatics and Technology Digital technology, Department of E-commerce and Digital Economy (Ministry of Industry and Trade) said that the Ministry of Industry and Trade has implemented a series of activities to support the promotion of the use of e-commerce applications in the business community and help narrow the gap between big cities and localities in terms of e-commerce development.

One of the solutions that has been implemented is to cooperate with major e-commerce platforms in the world to apply cross-border e-commerce. Thereby, Vietnamese special products produced by Vietnamese enterprises will be exported through e-commerce.

At a local perspective, Mr. Pham Thanh Nam, Deputy Director of the Center for Industrial Promotion and Trade Promotion, Department of Industry and Trade of Tra Vinh province, said that Tra Vinh province is currently focusing on developing OCOP products and typical rural industrial products, as well as typical products of traditional handicrafts of ethnic minority areas on e-commerce platforms; especially supporting five-star OCOP products to participate in the booths of international e-commerce platforms.

Besides, Tra Vinh also deployed linking trading floors between provinces, in which Tra Vinh has linked eighteen provinces in the Eastern and Western regions, such as Kien Giang, An Giang, Tay Ninh. , Quang Binh, Thua Thien Hue... to support businesses in connecting supply and demand and searching for commodity markets.

Looking from a business perspective, Ms. Vu Thi Le Thuy, Director of 3T Farm Cooperative, said that using e-commerce channels helps reach consumers very quickly and reach the majority, even is to reach the target customer segment. However, the difficulty of cooperatives is that 100% are farmers; Technology knowledge is almost zero, so they haven’t exploited to use digital platforms effectively.

Ms. Vu Thi Le Thuy expressed that businesses want to promote sales on e-commerce platforms, especially the livestream sales method because of the current consumer trend of wanting to buy directly. and experience the agricultural products you want to buy.

“We really hope that in the upcoming Cao Phong orange harvest season, we will receive the attention of all levels of government, ministries and branches, especially e-commerce floors and the E-Commerce Department to support us when it comes to harvest time. When the product achieves the best quality, it will be supported with livestream communication to sell in the shortest amount of time and achieve a breakthrough in output," Ms. Vu Thi Le Thuy expressed.

Needing to apply multi-channel sales trends

Ms. Hoang Thi Huyen, Head of Online Business Department - Sales and Distribution Center, Vietnam Post Corporation, said that in the process of supporting agricultural product services, especially fresh agricultural products, logistics issues are always a concern. This is a very painful problem. Even if we have a very complete logistics chain from packaging to storage, we have to make choices so that the product has the lowest possible risk.

Solving that problem, Ms. Hoang Thi Huyen said that the logistics project for fresh agricultural products will be implemented in 2024. "When we open this service, there will be the cooperation of 63 provincial post offices". With that cooperation, I believe there will be more advantages to develop consumption of products in ethnic minority and mountainous areas," Ms. Hoang Thi Huyen expressed.

Mr. Nguyen An Son said that businesses need to apply multi-channel sales trends, both maintaining traditional agricultural product consumption channels and applying e-commerce to consume sustainable products. Regarding the management agency, the Department of E-Commerce and Digital Economy will focus on solving difficulties related to protecting consumer rights and the issue of counterfeit and counterfeit goods. At the same time, organize human resource training classes on e-commerce applications, as well as digital technology for provinces, cities and localities.

At the same time, continue to organize local agricultural product consumption programs such as: Vietnam Online Friday online shopping program; Program to support businesses in applying national e-commerce application Go Online and Vietnamese online stores on local e-commerce platforms; Going further is supporting exports via e-commerce in markets such as the United States and China.