Main activities

We facilitate the process of product quality assurance, compliance with sustainability and food safety standards, and the acquisition of low-cost certification. In the vegetables sub-sector, we support farmer organisations to set up Participatory Guarantee Systems to monitor and certify compliance with either a food safety (BasicGAP) or Organic standard (PGS Vietnam).

We support the development of farmer organizations into business farmer organizations. We use the innovative tool “Scope Insight” to assess the level of professionalization of farmer organisations, and, based on this, we design the most relevant training plan for each organisation. We organize trainings on business and financial management, bookkeeping, effective leadership, marketing, etc. Furthermore, we create opportunities for farmers to participate in hands-on training sessions, farmer-to-farmer visits and product exhibits.

We help farmers and farmer organizations to develop fair business partnerships with private actors that are interested in sourcing directly from them. We strive to make the case for inclusive business models and relationships and support both companies and farmer organisations to make steps towards this goal.

We promote and help implement alternative farming approaches that are more sustainable and climate-friendly. The approaches we promote include sustainable agriculture, organic farming, and climate-smart agriculture. We use innovative and participatory methodologies to teach these approaches.

We help stimulate demand for safe and organic food by interacting with consumers on food safety issues. With the Safe and Organic Food Finder platform, we help urban consumers find safe vegetable stores in their neighbourhood. Furthermore, we also carry out consumer campaigns, advocate for stronger food safety policies, engage with the media and participate in multi-stakeholder dialogues.

We work with our colleagues from different Rikolto regions on joint programmes called “clusters”. Clusters have a change agenda at the global level and build on the diversity of experiences in order to contribute to evidence-building for systemic change at the global level. Together with Da Nang City, Rikolto in Vietnam is member of Rikolto's international “Food-Smart City Cluster”. Rikolto in Vietnam is also a part of Rikolto's international “Rice Cluster” which focuses on testing innovative practices and building evidence to help answer crucial questions in the rice sector in 9 countries: Indonesia, Vietnam, Tanzania, Uganda, DR Congo, Benin, Burkina, Mali and Senegal.