In the past, the province had paid due attention to building and developing brands for local specialties. However, there are still many “bottlenecks” that need to be removed in order to further promote the brand image of Lam Dong agricultural products.
According to statistics released at the Lam Dong brand development conference, recently held in Da Lat City, the locality has built 24 brands. Among them, 21 outstanding products have been registered for intellectual property rights, including 13 certification marks and eight collective marks; and four brands have been registered for the National Office of Intellectual Property of Vietnam to receive certification.
According to Lam Dong provincial Department of Industry and Trade, through market research and consultation with a number of domestic and foreign businesses and distribution units, there are many favourite agricultural products from Lam Dong such as Da Lat Flower, Da Lat Vegetable, B'Lao Tea, Bao Loc Silk, Da Huoai Durian, among others.
Dr. Pham S, Vice Chairman of the Lam Dong provincial People’s Committee said building a brand is one of the necessary conditions to join the global value chain in addition to implementing other activities such as trade promotion, investment cooperation, and brand promotion.
Determining the importance and value of brand promotion, in the past, authorities, farmers and enterprises have actively implemented activities in building and developing brands for typical products.
However, many experts, managers and businesses pointed out a series of limitations and difficulties that need to be resolved, such as few organisations and individuals being granted the right to use labels.
There are even many trademarks that have not been granted to any organisation or individual. In addition, registration to protect trademarks abroad is still limited. Currently, only a trademark of B’Lao Tea was registered for protection in China and is being protected in Singapore. There is also still a lack of post-harvest centres as well as brand promotion activities.
In particular, with the trademark named “Da Lat - Miracle from the good earth”, vegetables, flowers, arabica coffee and farming tourism products in Lam Dong is facing difficulties in identifying whether it is a brand or a slogan.
According to Nguyen Thi Anh Tuyet, Deputy Director of Anh Dao - Da Lat Cooperative, when the cooperative was granted the right to use this trademark, products with a clear origin from Da Lat were very welcomed by the market. However, through several surveys, only about 60% of customers knew the brand, the rest of them considered it was just a slogan of an enterprise. So more should be done to popularise this brand among customers, she noted.
There are currently 293 organisations and individuals in Lam Dong being granted the right to use 21 registered intellectual property trademarks. In particular, there are 237 certificates of the right to use the trademark “Da Lat - Miracle from the good earth” being granted to organisations and individuals in Da Lat, Lac Duong, Don Duong, Duc Trong and Lam Ha.
During recent times, departments and branches of Lam Dong province also organised many trade and brand promotion activities to build and connect many chains of distribution and seek business opportunities abroad. However, there is much work to do to manage them well and popularise the brands of local specialties.
More attention should be paid to registration to protect trademarks abroad; enhancing the value of agricultural products with the maintenance and development of high-tech and clean agriculture; strengthening connectivity; and accelerate brand promotion.
