Innovation

Nowadays, news about unhealthy food have been widely noticed on multi media, especially unclear origin food which may be harmful to our health. In Vietnam, people recently have cared much about the origin and quality of food supplied for their daily meals. They always want to find trusty suppliers which ensure 2 criteria: clear origin and safe to human. Housewives are reaching to big supermarkets or popular ones to buy fresh and safe materials for their family’s meals. However, according to some recent researches by journalist, vegetables at some supermarkets are not as clean and safe as they are advertised or customers believe. They are grown up by the support of chemical such as pesticides or growth stimulants which are long-term impact to people’s health. This is the premise for the release of “Online clean agricultural market – Box4Ps”.

Inspiration

After the meeting with Ms. Thuy – Operation Manager at Box4Ps and also the Leader of the project, she shared that even the knowledge about agricultural started at zero, based on her working with farmers that she got the knowledge of fertilizing, watering, and harvesting. When stating up in organic agriculture, she also met many difficulties. Firstly, Organic agriculture depends on weather and pests. Secondly, the technique is different from others. High production cost makes it difficult for us to find the customers. "Moreover, it is difficult to find clean agricultural products which meet the standard of organic products. When entering cheese producing area, we also met some difficulties because perfect cheese requires many factors. The quality of milk must be high so most cows are from Japan and Australia, farmers have to make sure that they do not use antibiotics and stimulants according to the regulation of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development. Farmers must feed cows with 20 necessary nutrients. Animal lodging has to be spacious where cows can relax. Workers are trained to become skilled in order to make qualified handmade cheese as one wrong step will lead to failed products. Temperature is also an important factor as high temperature leads to bad quality of cheese. The most difficult thing is that cheese is new in Vietnam market, many Vietnamese people do not know how to use cheese and the benefit of it. Thus when cheese was first launched, it did not attract consumers". She and her colleagues had to post on the website how to use each kind of cheese.

Overall impact

In recent years, e-commerce explodes in Vietnam and people start to care much the origin and quality of food. Moreover, it is supported by Pizza 4P which is a famous restaurant. These are opportunities for the project. However, there are many companies join organic food area so the competition is so high. Some companies are in agricultural area including organik online, Dalat gap or muahangviet.com.vn of Thanhnien news. They sell agricultural products online with competitive price compared with these in box 4p's. To develop with large scale need to have strong finance ability which is the weakness of start up company. Rapid development of organic food area which creates many choices for customers and increased the standard of food.

Business benefit

By joining the project, chosen farmers must comply with some strict requirements such as using the clear origin of seeds, no chemical is allowed in growth period. This is controlled by the project team by visiting farms regularly and applying safety inspections by third parties. Farmers in the project are supported by Box4Ps with cultivation techniques and ensure the output. This helps them to change to the positive crop methods which are environmental friendly and get stable income each month.

Social and environmental benefit

In the website of Box4Ps, there are many kinds of products from vegetables, fruits to fresh meat, beef, fish or even drinks, cakes, condiments and sauces. This makes the Box4Ps online market look like any type of market. However, in order to make it difference, Box4Ps focuses on 2 main areas: agricultural products which are grown up by non-chemical method and cheese hand-made from high quality milk.

By joining the project, chosen farmers must comply with some strict requirements such as using the clear origin of seeds, no chemical is allowed in growth period. This is controlled by the project team by visiting farms regularly and applying safety inspections by third parties. Farmers in the project are supported by Box4Ps with cultivation techniques and ensure the output. This helps them to change to the positive crop methods which are environmental friendly and get stable income each month.

"Along with the fresh foods, Box4Ps also offers a very unfamiliar product to Vietnam market. That is cheese. When connecting with farmers, we understood from some milk farm owners that they were worrying about the output for the cow milk. At that time, my friend had been back from Japan after finishing his research in cheese manufacturing. He was seeking for the pure source of milk to make cheese. We set up the cheese factory from Pizza4P’s. Cheeses are handmade with Japanese standards to provide for Pizza4P’s restaurants and some big hotels and restaurants in Ho Chi Minh city. Before sending out to the market, cheeses are carefully tested by standards cycles. The cheeses manufacture project has not only brought a stable income for some milk farm in Lam Dong but also is supplied in luxury restaurants and hotels".

Box4Ps is now on its development progress. The output is always ensured by the supported of Pizza4P’s restaurants and the fame of this brand has brought the trust to customers to continue using their products.

Interview

Nguyen Thi Thuy, Manager