Developing a Flexible Form of Collaborative and Inter-Organizational Governance: The Small Farmer-Focused Governance Model in Lam San Commune (Vietnam)

Over the past 40 years, agriculture has played a particularly important role in Vietnam’s economic development and socio-economic stability. The sector has guaranteed food security, income and jobs for more than 50 percent of the rural population and contributed to overall poverty reduction. Moreover, it is the only sector with an export surplus in the whole economy. These achievements have not been easy because Vietnam’s agriculture is small scale, still fairly backward, inefficient and hampered by the fact that “Farmers think seasonally, enterprises think business, governments think legislature” (Minister Le Minh Hoan, Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, 2018). Since 2002, the Government has developed many important policies in agriculture to promote collaboration between the main stakeholders (government–enterprises–farmers–scientists) to overcome the situation of the fragmented linkages. In this context, CG (Collaborative Governance) and IOG (Inter-Organizational Governance) are considered keys to success. This paper points out the necessity of CG and IOG in agricultural production in Vietnam and presents the Small Farmer-Focused Governance (SFFG) model applied in Lam San commune, in the province of Dong Nai. This model—so-called “farmers and enterprise under one roof”—can work like a “governance bubble” (i.e., shrink and expand) and thus take advantage of the flexibility of IOG to improve the production and export of pepper or another cash crop.