De Heus Aims to Achieve Strong Growth in Vietnam

As you know, our slogan is “together for better results”. So the success of De Heus comes from 2 sides: De Heus and our customers.

 

We have an experienced, enthusiastic and dedicated team. We spend a lot of time visiting farms, listening to farmers’ wants and needs, and better adapting to the Vietnamese conditions and environment. In addition, De Heus constantly commits to produce and supply stable quality and safe animal feed. Our fully equipped laboratory is evidence of this commitment. Besides we try to provide the best technical solutions for farmers to deal with diseases, the use of medicine and farm management. We are happy when our farmers and dealers are making profits on their healthy animals by using our feed.

 

Customers are the most important factor that leads to our success. We always try to be professional, reliable and helpful for our customers. We communicate very often with them to be able to understand them better. It’s customers that make the success of De Heus.

 

Farming has a very long tradition in Vietnam. Vietnamese farmers have a lot of knowledge and experience in this. However, we can improve production more by adapting better farm management (hygiene, climate, enough drinking water, etc). Farmers should also feed using the right feed at the right stage. The formulation for each stage is created to optimize the growth of the animal. So we strongly recommend our farmers use the right feed scheme for their animals.

 

It has a huge impact on our business because we are producing and selling feed for the local market. But 60 percent of the raw material is imported. And it means that 60 percent of our payment has to be settled in USD. Currently it’s still hard to buy dollars at banks. A fee charged on dollar sales is also another thing that can be difficult for companies like us.  We would really like to use more local raw materials, but there is simply not enough for the total demand of the Vietnamese animal feed sector. We try to make good demand forecasts and inform our banks in advance of the total needs we have, this helps, but it remains difficult. The longer term solution for Vietnam is clear for me: Vietnam has to reduce its trade deficit. With a smaller trade deficit or even a trade surplus, there will be less pressure on the VND and the shortages of USD will disappear. But for reduction of the trade deficit, it is necessary that Vietnam adds value to its produced products and raw materials. The Vietnamese government and Central Bank understand this very well, so I expect more focus on this issue in the years to come.   

 

It’s undeniable that Vietnam has improved its investment environment a lot, especially its administration reform, infrastructure facilities, financial and banking services and human resources. However, there are still many things that lie ahead. Vietnam needs to focus more on sustainable growth. Power supply has to be stable. We are a manufacturing company so we really rely on a stable electric supply. This is probably our biggest concern, especially at the end of the dry season. 

For the rest I really believe that Vietnam will remain a very promising and attractive destination for foreign capital.