This Review of Agricultural Policies: Viet Nam is one of a series of reviews of national agricultural policies undertaken by the OECD’s Committee for Agriculture (CoAg). It was initiated in response to a request from Mr. Bui Ba Bong, then Viet Nam’s Vice Minister of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (MARD), and has been prepared in close co-operation with the Ministry.

Doi Moi, or “Renovation”, reforms launched in the mid-1980s marked the beginning of the transition of the Vietnamese economy away from central planning towards greater market orientation. Since then, a long series of policy changes have continued to move the economy in this direction by opening markets, establishing private land use rights, reducing the role of state-owned enterprises and encouraging private investment.

This Review, undertaken in close co-operation with the Vietnamese Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (MARD), assesses the performance of Vietnamese agriculture over the last two decades, evaluates Vietnamese agricultural policy reforms and provides recommendations to address key challenges in the future. The evaluation is based on the OECD Committee for Agriculture’s approach that agriculture policy should be evidence-based and carefully designed and implemented to support productivity, competitiveness and sustainability, while avoiding unnecessary distortions to production decisions and to trade. Conducted in partnership with the OECD Investment Committee, the Review comprises a special chapter highlighting key challenges to be addressed to improve the investment climate in agriculture, drawing from the OECD Policy Framework for Investment in Agriculture.

This chapter provides the broad context in which the Vietnamese agricultural sector developed over the last two decades, including political, demographic, macroeconomic and social factors. It evaluates agriculture’s performance in terms of production, productivity and trade; outlines social impacts in terms of employment, incomes, poverty and food consumption; discusses environmental consequences; and finally, analyses structural issues both in agriculture and in its upstream and downstream sectors.

The focus of this chapter is on major developments in agricultural policy in Viet Nam since 2000. It describes the framework of agricultural policy with regard to key policy objectives, the major phases of policy development, and the legal and institutional arrangements for administering agricultural policy. Domestic agriculture-related policies are then described, with polices grouped in accordance with the indicators of agricultural support developed by the OECD. It is followed by a detailed examination of trade policies relating to the agro-food sector. Support provided to agriculture and the cost that these policies impose on Vietnamese consumers and taxpayers are then estimated. The final section summarises the main conclusions.

This chapter highlights key challenges to be addressed to improve the policy framework for sustainable investment in agriculture, drawing from the OECD Policy Framework for Investment in Agriculture. First, it examines the key trends of domestic and foreign investment in agriculture since the Doi Moi reforms in 1986, and provides an overview of Viet Nam’s investment policy, focusing on efforts to promote public-private partnerships, reduce the role of state-owned enterprises and enhance food safety. Then, it examines policies and measures for investment promotion, including investment incentives and licensing procedures, and describes land tenure policy as secure land tenure is a key condition for sustainable investment in agriculture. It also analyses existing policies intending to facilitate access to finance by agricultural investors, and examines the constraints faced by investors arising from infrastructure development, trade policy, human resource development and research. Finally, it reviews policies aiming to promote responsible business conduct in agriculture. The last section summarises the key findings of the chapter.