Son La province showcased its OCOP (One Commune One Product) products at the National Press Festival 2024 in Ho Chi Minh City on March 15-17.

Over the past years, Mai Son district has worked to lure more investments in agricultural processing factories, and set up linkages in developing raw material areas, contributing to raising product values and promoting sustainable development.

Son La province is home to over 36 safe vegetable supply chains, with a total area of ​​over 300 hectares and an annual output of about 13,000 tonnes. The vegetables undergo strict supervisions from variety selection and irrigation to the use of fertilizers and pesticides in line with VietGAP standards, providing safe products for consumers.

Son La province is home to 20,926 hectares of coffee, mainly Arabica, with Mai Son, Thuan Chau, Yen Chau and Sop Cop districts and Son La city as the main growing areas.

Implementing the One Commune One Product (OCOP) programme, to date, Son La province has had 151 OCOP products rated 3-5 stars, which are divided into five main groups of food and beverages, herbs, souvenirs, services, and rural tourism.

Son La province has been assigned to realise over 3.99 trillion VND (161.6 million USD) worth of public investment in 2024. In February, departments, agencies, and People's Committees of districts and Son La city focused on implementing the plan, and allocated in detail over 2.96 trillion VND to their units.

Son La province’s total aquatic output in February is estimated at 113 tonnes, including 86 tonnes of fish, 23 tonnes of shrimp, and 4 tonnes of others.

Son La province’s state budget collection stood at 470 billion VND (19.08 million USD) in the first two months of this year, equivalent to 10.5% of the estimate assigned by the provincial People’s Council.

In recent years, Son La has become a bright spot of the northwest region in socio-economic development, especially agriculture and tourism. On December 25, 2023, the Prime Minister approved the Master Plan of Son La province for the 2021-2030 period, with a vision to 2050. This is the legal basis to synchronously connect planning schemes of administrations at all levels and sectors; shape strategic breakthroughs in institutional reform and infrastructure development; and promote the attraction of domestic and foreign investments.

Son La province's industrial structure last year changed in the direction of increasing the proportion of manufacturing and processing industries, and gradually narrowing the mining industry.

The value of goods exports and imports between Son La province and its neighbouring Lao provinces reached over 982,000 USD in 2023.

The total area of fruit trees in Son La province reached 71,380 hectares in 2023, an increase of 1.12% (941 hectares) from the same period the previous year, reported the provincial Statistics Office.

This year's spring crop, Song Ma district planted over 1,790 hectares of rice, with the main varieties being fragrant sticky rice 86, sticky rice 86, 87, 97 and BC15, Dien Bien, Nhi Uu and Nghi Huong sticky rice. 

In January, the total output of aquatic products in Son La province reached nearly 900 tonnes, a year-on-year increase of 4%. Of the total, farming output reached 770 tonnes, and 125 tonnes were caught.

Minh Tien Group Joint Stock Company is currently implementing coffee production and consumption linkages with 470 households on a total area of 543.7 hectares in four hamlets in Chieng Mai, Chieng Ban and Na Ot communes, Mai Son district.

Currently, Bac Yen district has nearly 563 hectares of cardamom grown under the canopy of natural forests, with an output of nearly 550 tonnes per year, bringing in an income of about 40 million VND (1,636 USD) per ha. 

With 84,752 hectares of fruit trees, Son La has become the largest fruit garden in the North. It also boasts the largest Arabica coffee area in the country with over 20,000 hectares; along with 5,235 hectares of tea, 9,259 hectares of sugarcane, 42,537 hectares of corn, and over 15,300 hectares of cassava.

Son La has so far had 27 products bearing the local name granted protection certificates, along with five high-tech agricultural areas, and 280 safe food and seafood supply chains.

Now Son La province has 864 agricultural cooperatives and six agricultural cooperative unions with 30 member cooperatives.

With the aim of building key, signature agricultural products of each region, Son La province has focused on developing items under the “One Commune-One Product” (OCOP) programme in line with the process of agricultural production restructuring, thus contributing to increasing income and product value, and protecting the environment.