The costs of obtaining food security in Vietnam

ssumption that land 
for producing paddy continues decreasing 
as the average rate during the period of 
2000-2007. The number of crop per year 
is expected to be unchanged, 1.8 crops per 
year. In order to meet increasing demand 
with decreasing paddy cultivated area, the 
yield must be raised. Keeping 2.5% yield 
increase per annual until 2020 is proposed. 
In the demand side, three necessary domestic 
demands, which are seed, animal feed and 
214 
171 
180 
203 
40.1 
50 52 
69.9 
13.6 13.7 
51 
62.8 
1.7 2.9 
10.3 30.2 
0 
50 
100 
150 
200 
250 
1985 1990 2000 2005 
Vegetables Fish Meat Egg and milk 
33Ho Chi Minh City Open University Journal of science- No. 1(1) 2011
2007* 2010 2015 2020 Assumptions
1. Population (million people)* 85.2 88.5 93.6 98.6
2. Planted paddy area (million ha) 4.10 3.98 3.78 3.59 1% decrease per annual
3. Cultivated paddy area (million ha) 7.20 7.16 6.80 6.46 1.8 crops per year, unchanged
4. Yield (tone/ha/crop) 4.98 5.35 6.02 6.78 2.5 % increase per annual
5. Supply (million tones) 35.8 38.32 40.96 43.77
6. Necessary Demands (million tones) 
 - Seed 1.10 1.09 1.04 0.99
 - Animal feed 6.4 7.26 8.90 10.90 4.5% increase per annual
 -Human consumption 19.97 19.79 20.02 20.17 1.7% decrease in rice consumption per person per annual
7. Balance (million tones) 
(Reserve, process and exports) 8.33 10.17 11.00 11.71
Table 5
Balancing paddy demand and Supply, 2020
Source : Estiamted
Note : * Adapted from Chu Tien Quang, 2008.
human consumption, must be projected. 
Paddy demand for seed is based on the 
projected cultivated area and the unchanged 
amount of paddy seed per cultivated ha. The 
projected human consumption is based on 
the forecasted population growth and rice 
consumption per person per year that is 
expected to be 1.7% decrease per year. The 
amount of paddy for human consumption 
in 2020 will be about 20 million tones. In 
order to project the amount of paddy for 
animal feed, over the period of 2000-2005, 
the meat consumption increased by 4.5% 
per annual in average as studied by the 
Vietnamese Institute of Nutrition. Thus 
the demand of paddy for animal feed is 
projected to increase by 4.5% per annual. 
In 2020, Vietnam will need 11 million tones 
of paddy for animal feed that is about a half 
of human consumption. In conclusion, the 
necessary demands (seed, animal feed and 
human consumption) in 2020 will be about 
31 million tones, if there is no change in 
supply (35.8 million tones in 2007), there 
are only 4 million tones left for the other 
demands such as reserve, processing and 
exports) in 2020. If taking above projected 
paddy supply and necessary demands 
together, Vietnam will have 11.71 million 
tones left for reserve, processing and 
exports in 2020. 
The projection of paddy production 
in 2020 must depend on the assumption of 
2.5% increase in paddy yield per annual 
that is the average rate over the period of 
2000-2007. However, in order to achieve 
that assumed rate is not easy that depends 
on many factors. Figures in Table 6 provide 
the projection of necessary demands, supply 
and balance by different scenarios of yield, 
2.5%, 2%, 1.5%, 1%, 0.5% and 0% increase 
per annual. The important signal is that if 
the paddy yield is unchanged from now to 
2020, Vietnam will have only 0.11 million 
tones of paddy for reserve, processing 
and exports in 2020. Vietnam will face 
with the food insecurity at the national 
level. Therefore, under the pressure of the 
decreasing paddy area, in order to obtain 
food security, Vietnam must look for 
strategies to increase the paddy yield.
 v. Costs of Obtaining Food Security 
in vietnam
Like several Asian countries in the 
region, rice in daily diet is a Vietnamese 
34 Ho Chi Minh City Open University Journal of science- No. 1(1) 2011
tradition, after any generous meal without 
rice, Vietnamese people feels that they have 
not finished the meal. Rice is a staple food 
that cannot be substituted. If food security 
is a problem in the world, rice security is an 
Vietnamese issue. Obtaining rice security 
must be considered as a first priority for 
political and social gains, and in turn 
economic stability. As discussed above, in 
order to meet the objective of food security, 
Vietnam must focus on the supply side since 
the increasing demand cannot be reduced. 
There are two options for increasing paddy 
production that are the expansion of paddy 
land areas and improving yield. Those 
impose some costs in terms of economic 
development in Vietnam. Agricultural 
growth, industrial growth and household 
incomes may be negatively affected by the 
obtaining food security. 
The option that increases the paddy 
yield is rather difficult since the yield in 
Vietnam is currently high. There are some 
constraints in increasing the yield including 
technological and economic constraints. 
The rice production is, of course, 
characterized by the law of diminishing 
marginal product. Getting higher rice yield 
needs high level of inputs and investments 
that may not be efficient.
Table 6
Supply, demand and balance of paddy by yield assumptions, 
vietnam, until 2020, (million tones)
Source : Estimated.
ofAssumption
increase in yield 2007 2010 2015 2020
2.5% per annual
Supply 35.80 38.32 40.96 43.77
Demand (seed, animal feed and human) 27.47 28.15 29.96 32.06
Balance (reserve, exports, processing) 8.33 10.17 11.00 11.71
2.0% per annual
Supply 35.80 37.79 39.49 41.27
Demand (seed, animal feed and human) 27.47 28.15 29.96 32.06
Balance (reserve, exports, processing) 8.33 9.64 9.53 9.20
1.5% per annual
Supply 35.80 37.25 38.05 38.85
Demand (seed, animal feed and human) 27.47 28.15 29.96 32.06
Balance (reserve, exports, processing) 8.33 9.10 8.09 6.79
1.0% per annual
Supply 35.80 36.72 36.63 36.54
Demand (seed, animal feed and human) 27.47 28.15 29.96 32.06
Balance (reserve, exports, processing) 8.33 8.57 6.67 4.47
0.5% per annual
Supply 35.80 36.18 35.23 34.31
Demand (seed, animal feed and human) 27.47 28.15 29.96 32.06
Balance (reserve, exports, processing) 8.33 8.03 5.28 2.25
0.0% per annual
Supply 35.80 35.65 33.87 32.17
Demand (seed, animal feed and human) 27.47 28.15 29.96 32.06
Balance (reserve, exports, processing) 8.33 7.50 3.91 0.11
35Ho Chi Minh City Open University Journal of science- No. 1(1) 2011
Staple Food
vegetables, 
beans
Fruits Fishery
2000 6.57 8.14 10.81 33.93
2001 6.69 8.71 10.50 33.58
2002 7.16 9.19 10.17 34.60
2003 7.29 9.62 9.69 35.27
2004 7.54 9.67 9.85 37.43
2005 7.61 10.39 10.44 40.51
Average 7.14 9.28 10.24 35.89
Index, staple food=1 1 1.30 1.43 5.02
Table 7 
Comparison of staple food production with the others 
(million vNd/ha, constant prices in 1994)
Source: Estimated by using data of GSO (2006 and 2008)
Reserve or expansion of land for 
paddy growing to meet the objective of food 
security may lower the agricultural growth. 
In general, land productivity of rice is much 
smaller than that of other crops. Based on the 
official data of GSO, it is estimated that one 
hectare of land for producing vegetables, 
sugar and beans, for fruits and for fishery 
is equal to 1.30, 1.43 and 5.02 times as that 
for paddy production, respectively (see 
Table 7). Thus, shifting land from non-
paddy production to paddy production 
will result in lower land productivity and 
smaller agricultural production. Over the 
period of 1990-2007, the average growth 
rate of agricultural sector was about 4% 
per annual, while the average growth rate 
of paddy production was 1.1%, particularly 
it became negative for the period of 2000-
2007 (-0.8%). Moreover, if the government 
prohibits farmers to change their crops from 
paddy to other crops to reserve paddy land 
for the purpose of rice security, the value 
of agricultural production is difficult to 
increase and in turn, the agricultural growth 
is negatively affected.
The strategy to meet the objective 
of food security creates negative impacts 
not only on agricultural growth but also 
on economic growth in general. The 
problem of converting paddy land to non-
agricultural uses such as building industrial 
parks, golf and etc. has been criticized by 
many people. If because of worrying rice 
security, the government stops that land 
converting, the cost is too high. It will 
affect the process of industrialization and 
slowdown positive structural change and 
thus economic growth.
For an exported food country like 
Vietnam, obtaining food security by 
restricting exports in order to maintain 
domestic consumption will result in lost 
export revenue and foreign exchange 
earnings (FAO, 2008) that happened in 
Vietnam in the first months of 2008 as the 
global food crisis occurred. It is also noted 
that although Vietnam is enjoyable with 
its rice exports but the contribution of rice 
exports to total exports is still limited. The 
agricultural exports contributed about 15% 
of total exports, but exports of commercial 
crops such as rubber, coffee, pepper and 
cashew nut play crucial role. Fishery 
exports have been playing important 
role in recent years, if the government 
attempts to keep paddy land that may lead 
to negative impacts on fishery exports and 
thus on total exports. 
The other negative impact of rice 
security at national level may be food 
insecurity at the household level. Small 
36 Ho Chi Minh City Open University Journal of science- No. 1(1) 2011
farm households keeping their small rice 
farm may not lead them to a low income 
family who cannot access to food and thus 
the food insecurity at household level.
vI. Conclusions and policy 
Recommendations
There is a trade-off between obtaining 
food security and economic development in 
Vietnam. The increase in food demand as 
population pressure is unavoidable. In order 
to meet increasing demand, rice supply must 
be increasing. In order to increase rice supply 
to obtain food security, political and social 
stability can be achieved, but some negative 
impacts on economic development occur. 
Keeping or expansion of paddy land for food 
security will dampen agricultural growth and 
thus economic growth as a whole, because of 
forgone high land productivity of the other 
crops. Lower land productivity for paddy 
production cannot improve incomes of poor 
rice farmers that result in food insecurity 
at the household level. Because of food 
security, preventing from the using paddy 
land for the purpose of industrialization 
may harm the industrial development and 
thus economic development as a whole.
Regarding to the issue of food security 
in Vietnam, this study recommends some 
policies as follows. The government should 
set a priority on increasing the paddy yield 
rather than regulating changes of land areas. 
If the paddy yield is not increased, the food 
security may achieve until 2020, however, 
the problem will become serious after 
2020. Increasing paddy yield is not simple, 
it requires a lot of investments. Improving 
technology must be considered as a decisive 
strategy, biotechnology in particular. 
Since there are different types of 
demand for rice, the strategy of variety 
selection becomes important issue. In 
general, a high-yield variety usually results 
in low quality and vice versa. High-quality 
varieties must be applied for rice exports, 
while high-yield varieties are grown for 
animal feed and middle-quality varieties 
with middle-yield should be grown for 
human consumption.
Global food crisis generates more 
benefits than harms for Vietnamese 
agricultural sector and economy. Because 
Vietnam has been a net food export country, 
it benefits from high international food 
price as a result of global food crisis. Food 
insecurity in the world is an opportunity 
for Vietnam obtaining food security at both 
national and household levels. Vietnamese 
rice farmers get benefits from higher price 
and thus they do more investments and get 
higher yield that results in more supply 
and positive impacts on food security at 
national level. Poor rice farmers now get 
more incomes from their small amount of 
rice selling. Higher international rice price 
will bring more foreign exchanges from 
the some volume of rice exports. However, 
high prices of food my lead to difficulties 
in macroeconomic management that affects 
economic growth in the short run and in the 
long run. Higher prices of food significantly 
influence consumer price index (CPI) 
because food expenditures share about 47% 
of Vietnamese consumers’ basket. High CPI 
leads to inflation that may be a problem for 
macroeconomics.
vII. References
Chu Tien Quang, 2008, San Xuat Lua Gao 
va Van De An Ninh Luong Thuc o Viet 
Nam [Rice Production and Problems 
of Food Security in Vietnam], Bao 
cao Hoi Nghi Khoa Hoc Kinh Te, 27-
28/11/2008, Hanoi.
FAO, 2008. The state of food insecurity 
in the world, 
icatalog/ inter-e.htm
General Statistical Office (GSO), 2007. 
Statistical Yearbook 2006, Statistical 
Publishing House, Hanoi.
General Statistical Office (GSO), 2008. 
Statistical Yearbook 2007, Statistical 
Publishing House, Hanoi.
37Ho Chi Minh City Open University Journal of science- No. 1(1) 2011
GSO, 2009. ‘Consumption expenditure and 
consumption expenditure for living’, 
extracted from Vietnam Household 
Living Standard Survey, 
gso.org.vn 
Nguyen T. Song An and others, 2001. 
Household Food Security in the Tu 
Giac Long Xuyen. Research Project, 
Code: B99-22-50.
Nguyen Van Sanh (2005) ‘Food Security, 
Livelihood and Rural Development’, 
A Report at a Workshop on Food 
Security in Vietnam in Nong Lam 
University, October 2005.
Pham Thi Lan Anh, Pham Van Hoan and 
Nguyen Duc Minh, 2009. ‘Nguy Co 
Mat An Ninh Thuc Pham do Bien 
Dong ve Tu Nhien va Kinh Te Xa 
Hoi [Risk of losing foodstuff security 
due to Natural and Socio-economic 
changes]’, (
vn/Information%20Service/Report/
Plenary%20Meeting%20Report%20
17-11-2008/Group%203/Bao%20
cao%20tham%20luan%20Bo%20
Y%20te%20(Mr.Hoan).doc
Trang Thu Huy Nhat and Tran Quang 
Van, 2008. ‘Food security and rural 
development’ in Bases for Territory-
based Rural Development in the 
Southeast Region, Vietnam, Nguyen 
Van Ngai and Le Thanh Loan 
(eds.),VNU-HCM Publisher, Ho Chi 
Minh City.
Trung Tam Tin va Tu lieu, CIEM, 2008. Dam 
Bao An Ninh Luong Thuc The Gioi va 
Viet Nam [Obtaining Food Secrity in 
the World and Vietnam]. 
ciem.org.vn/home/vn/home/InfoList.
jsp?area=1&cat=124:bang 
Vietnam Media, 2008. ‘Vietnam co nguy co 
mat 5 trieu tan thoc do bien doi khi hau, 
[Vietnam can lose 5 million tomes of 
paddy per year due climate changes]’, 
38 Ho Chi Minh City Open University Journal of science- No. 1(1) 2011