Baria-Vung Tau to develop $40-mln high-tech agricultural zone

Ba Ria-Vung Tau authorities have approved a scheme to develop the southern province's first high-tech agricultural zone with an investment of VND1,000 billion ($40.3 million).

The 711-hectare area in Chau Duc district will mobilize capital from both the provincial budget and private sector.

From 2025, the scheme aims to allocate 10-15% of the land for annual plants like vegetables, flowers, and mushrooms; and the remaining 85%-90% for long-term fruit and industrial trees, with priorities given to avocado, durian, jackfruit, banana, cocoa, and pepper as they grow well on basalt land.

The zone seeks to nurture high-technology agricultural firms that follow value chains and create spillover effects in the domestic agricultural sector toward industrialization and modernization.

It also seeks to build a high-tech agricultural service and processing complex of 10-15 hectares and infrastructure for smart agriculture, including power grids, water reservoirs, an inner traffic, and telecommunication system.

Ba Ria-Vung Tau plans to make high-tech agriculture account for at least half of its agricultural output by 2025.

The province currently has 344 high-tech cultivation facilities covering 5,272 hectares, 127 high-tech animal farms of 515 hectares, and 19 high-tech fisheries farms covering 409.7 hectares, according to the provincial statistics office.

The production value of high-tech agriculture has reached VND4,897 billion ($197 million) a year, or 32.8% of the provincial agricultural sector's production value.