Ho Chi Minh City’s Department of Agriculture and Rural Development and the municipal Farmers’ Association have signed an agreement to improve their cooperation in agriculture and new rural development. They will boost high-tech agriculture and help farmers restructure their production with the ultimate goal of establishing a sustainable urban agriculture during the 2014-2020 period. To start, 120 advisers and more than 1000 farmers will be trained to apply some advanced techniques to local farm production. Municipal authorities have also stepped up efforts to improve vocational training and overall support for production. Nguyen Van Quyt is chairman of District 12’s Farmers’ Association: "As we move towards an urban agriculture, farmers have to restructure their production by increasing investment in plants and animals with higher economic values. This will entail developing a more high-tech approach to agriculture. Beyond offering local farmers vocational training and new technology, we will also provide them development capital in accordance with a municipal initiative to boost production."

Greenhouse farming is becoming increasingly popular in Ho Chi Minh City, replacing riskier traditional farming methods and stabilizing local farm income. Nguyen Ngoc Long is a farmer in Thoi Tam commune, District 12. Long now owns 4 greenhouse gardens of cactus on an area of 40,000 square meters. This has generated jobs for dozens of workers with an average monthly salary of 200 USD. Long told VOV: "I was given an opportunity to learn advanced farming techniques in other provinces by the municipal farmers’ association. Cactus needs to be grown in greenhouse gardens. Modern farming techniques are no big deal. They are, in fact, very simple and effective farming methods."

The city is constructing a new high-tech agriculture park, the first of its kind in Vietnam, in Cu Chi district, on an area of 88 hectares. A bio-tech center is also being built in the city’s district 12, covering an area of 23 hectares. This center, also the first of its kind in Vietnam, will be a multi-function complex engaged in research and development, training, technology transfer, and manufacturing of bio-products for use in agriculture, medicine, pharmaceutics, and environment. Other high-tech centers specialized in husbandry and fishery will be built in Binh Chanh and Can Gio district, paving the way for other high-tech agricultural production zones that will turn out profitable products. Nguyen Phuoc Trung is Director of Ho Chi Minh City’s Department of Agriculture and Rural Development: "We’ll expand the bio-tech center with the hope of transfering more advanced technologies to the farmers and organizing more vocational training programs for them. We’ll also continue to invest in rural infrastructure to support the new high-tech agriculture."

Ho Chi Minh City has seen higher agricultural productivity in many localities thanks to the local authorities' application of high tech to farm production.