The 42nd International Pepper Session and Meetings

In the Openning Speech by Dr. Le Quoc Doanh, Vice Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development of Viet Nam at The 42^nd International Pepper Session and Meetings were held in Ho Chi Minh city from 27 – 30 October 2014, mentioned that “The pepper production industry was expected to have significant growth with a high added value, generating many benefits for producers, processors and exporters, contributing to stable national employment and sustainable national economic development”. The Meeting was attended by almost 400 participants from 6 IPC member countries (Brazil, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Brazil and Vietnam) and non-member countries as well. The particpants came from government agencies, research institutions, producers, processors and traders of pepper product The Meeting was officially openned by Dr. Le Quoc Doanh, Vice Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development of Viet Nam. In his Openning Speech, Vice Minister mentioned pepper was an important vegetable spice consumed in most countries around the world. Despite the global financial and economic crisis, the world’s total export turn over and market price of pepper have been steadily increasing from US$1.58 billion in 2011 to US$1.9 billion in 2013 and it was forecasted to raise to US$2.4 billion in 2014. The pepper production industry was expected to have significant growth with a high added value, generating many benefits for producers, processors and exporters, contributing to stable national employment and sustainable national economic development. Vietnam’s pepper has been present in over 100 countries around the world. Vietnam continues to maintain the world’s highest record producerand exporter for 14 consecutive years. It was expected that pepper export of Viet Nam would return over US$ 1 billion in 2014. The Vice Minister also proposed the Meeting to discusson how to strengthen the collaboration and cooperation within the IPC framework, focusing on a number of areas such as science and technology cooperation in response to climate change impacts, disease control, sustainable and environmental-friendly pepper development, high-tech investment in order to generate more value added products and stable prices at the international markets. At the side of the IPC 42, MARD in collaboration with Viet Nam Pepper Association (VPA) also organized the Pepper Exhibition, technical meetings and private meeting between different trade partners from diffirent countries to seek for business opportunities.