The use of digital platforms and artificial intelligence (AI) for the certification and traceability of agricultural products is being increasingly promoted to ensure transparency of origin and enhance the competitiveness of Vietnamese farm produce in international markets.
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| Consumers use smartphones to trace the origins of agricultural products at an exhibition showcasing Dong Nai’s agricultural achievements in 2025. |
This is not only a matter for businesses. Cooperatives and farmers must also proactively adopt digital tools, beginning with electronic production logs. This enables the origin of agricultural products to be managed and made transparent from production through inspection and traceability.
Transparency from the farm
Countries importing agricultural products are imposing increasingly stringent traceability requirements, particularly regarding transparency in farming practices. Digitalization at the farm level has therefore become essential. In the past, farmers recorded cultivation activities in paper notebooks, making document-based traceability time-consuming and inefficient. Replacing paper records with electronic logs offers significant advantages and helps reduce errors. Electronic logs can capture all production activities in line with the standards required by individual agricultural export markets, enabling farmers to adjust their cultivation practices accordingly.
Queen Farm Vietnam in Phuoc Son Commune is stepping up the use of AI in production. The farm manages its durian orchards, which span dozens of hectares, through a digital map. Each durian tree is individually identified and has its own health profile, allowing the farm to apply appropriate care measures. Particular attention is paid to maintaining electronic production logs, which are updated daily with information on crop-care practices, including fertilizer and pesticide use, application rates, and pre-harvest intervals. These records enable the farm to closely monitor its cultivation and crop-care processes and also serve as a basis for managing, inspecting, and tracing the origins of its agricultural products.
Phan Thi Thu Hien, Director of Plant Quarantine Center II under the Department of Crop Production and Plant Protection, said Government Resolution No. 36/2026/NQ-CP on simplifying administrative procedures for growing-area codes and packing-facility codes contains several new provisions. One of the key changes is the simplification of procedures for granting growing-area codes and a shift from a “pre-inspection” to a “post-inspection” approach. Under the new model, farmers take the lead in ensuring safe production, maintaining electronic logs, and assuming responsibility for the traceability of their agricultural products. Previously, production records kept in notebooks could easily be lost or contain missing information. Today, data can be updated via smartphones and connected to centralized systems, where it can be monitored at multiple levels by local and central authorities, as well as by overseas partners. Farmers are therefore required to maintain complete production records. Failure to comply can result in accountability during post-inspections, making accurate record-keeping a substantive requirement rather than a mere formality.
Building human resources
Accelerating digital transformation and the adoption of AI are opening new opportunities for precision agriculture and greater transparency, from managing growing areas and tracing product origins to marketing and distribution. These advances are contributing to the development of a modern and sustainable agricultural sector. Businesses are also ready to work alongside cooperatives and farmers to help them adopt AI and build integrated value chains from production to consumption.
Wilson Lieu, Vice Chairman of the AI for Agriculture Division of the Vietnam Agribusiness Club and Director of the Institute of Applied AI & Digital Workforce Development under the Vietnam Scientific Association for Development of Talents - Human Resources, said the first and most important factor in agricultural digital transformation is the people implementing it. “Digital transformation must begin with cooperatives, and every farmer needs to know how to use these tools,” he said. “The AI for Agriculture Division’s role is to help farmers work more efficiently while building digital transformation capabilities across the entire agricultural value chain.” The division has developed training programs tailored to different groups. For ethnic minority communities, for example, access to technology can be particularly challenging. “When we provide training for ethnic minority farmers, we work alongside them step by step, helping them perform each operation and apply AI to product promotion through the simplest and most practical procedures,” Lieu said.
From another perspective, Tang Hieu Ngoc, a representative of the China Certification & Inspection Group (CCIC), said the organization is accelerating the use of digital technologies and AI to improve management efficiency, transparency, and end-to-end traceability across supply chains. “Our traceability solution integrates information from the entire process into a single traceability code, covering field verification, harvesting, preliminary processing, sampling and testing, packing, shipment, and transportation monitoring,” she said. CCIC Vietnam is also applying AI to traceability, combined with a single-window customs clearance mechanism, significantly shortening inspection and clearance procedures. “Customs clearance now takes only half a day, compared with two to three days previously,” Tang said.
According to Tran Thi Minh Ha, Chairwoman of the Vietnam Agribusiness Club, export markets need a stable supply produced through integrated value chains, with products meeting required standards and having traceable origins. AI and digital transformation are key to standardizing emerging areas, making data more transparent, and strengthening the competitiveness of agricultural exports.
By Binh Nguyen – Translated by Mai Nga, Minho
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