Herbs from the Quang Nam highlands are the source of raw materials for many start-up projects in the province. Photo: PHAN VINH taken on March 23, 2025.

Start with local capital

Participating in the 2023 Bac Tra My District Creative Startup Ideas Competition, Tra My cinnamon candy product - a local creation combining the essence of wild cinnamon and the traditional processing method of the young girl Gian Thi Tra My (Tra Nu commune, Bac Tra My) attracted a lot of attention. The project won the third prize of the competition, but since then, this idea has not been able to become a real commercial product.

Ms. Tra My encountered many difficulties when accessing preferential loans to invest in the province's startup project. Photo provided by the character.

“I want to produce cinnamon candy regularly, but I don’t have a dryer. It’s still bearable in the dry season, so I can dry a few batches of products. But in the rainy season, all activities have to stop. Machinery, packaging, and labels all require capital, and it’s difficult for someone in a mountainous area like me to access bank loans or complicated support programs. Sometimes I feel very discouraged, because I have an idea, a product, and a small market, but I can’t develop it,” My shared.

Not only lack of capital, barriers in skills and management knowledge also cause many start-up models to "die young" or stagnate.

Mr. Tra Quang Nhat Viet (Dai Lanh commune, Dai Loc) is a medical doctor who started a business with a project to produce health protection products from local herbs such as foot bath powder, massage wine, body detox tea... and won third prize in the province's creative startup competition in 2024. However, currently, despite investing in modern machinery and equipment, production is still slow due to difficulty in accessing the market.

Mr. Viet's products have difficulty expanding the market. Photo: PHAN VINH taken on March 23, 2025

"I have professional knowledge of Oriental medicine because this is a family profession that I have continued for 4 generations. But examining and treating patients at home as a traditional doctor is completely different from developing herbal products on the market. When I started commercializing medicinal products, I found that I lacked many things such as human resources with business and marketing capabilities, knowledge of cash flow management, product research and pricing..." - Mr. Viet said.

[VIDEO] - Mr. Tra Quang Nhat Viet shares about the difficulties in developing his herbal startup project:

A survey by the Quang Nam Province Startup Support Steering Committee shows that about 70% of local agricultural startups in Quang Nam do not have formal knowledge of business models, capital raising skills or market access. Meanwhile, training programs are often scattered, mainly concentrated in district and city centers, making it difficult to reach the most needy.

Need practical support

According to Mr. Pham Ngoc Sinh - Deputy Director of the Department of Science and Technology, Head of the Executive Board for supporting creative startups in Quang Nam province, the biggest difficulty currently facing indigenous startup models is the lack of close support in terms of finance, market and training system.

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Many young people are very creative, some come to me and ask "can I make products from this material, that material", it sounds very new. That shows enthusiasm, but most of them are lacking a systematic roadmap to turn ideas into commercial products accepted by the market.

Mr. Pham Ngoc Sinh - Deputy Director of Department of Science and Technology, Head of the Executive Board for supporting creative startups in Quang Nam province

Many start-up projects in the province have had to stop operating due to lack of capital. Photo: PHAN VINH

Quang Nam currently has nearly 100 innovative start-up models with indigenous elements. However, most of them are small-scale, lack management capacity, and have weak market connections. Some entities still underestimate product pricing and do not know how to communicate or call for community capital.

According to the report of the Provincial Startup Support Executive Board, in the past 4 years (2021 - 2024), the province has supported 28 startup projects with more than 2.5 billion VND, organized more than 40 training courses for more than 1,200 students, and deployed startup consulting points in 7 districts and towns. However, according to experts' assessment, the support is still scattered, not reaching out to potential groups in rural and mountainous areas.

The problem of highly qualified human resources is also a limitation of start-up projects in the province. Photo: PHAN VINH

From this reality, experts suggest that there should be “microfinance packages” suitable for business households, and specialized training sessions on topics such as capital raising, chain management, logistics, and export. In addition, it is necessary to develop a support team and experienced startup consultants to accompany the project in the first phase.

[VIDEO] - Mr. Pham Ngoc Sinh - Deputy Director of the Department of Science and Technology, Head of the Provincial Startup Support Executive Board shared about the groups of issues that startups need to pay attention to:

“To develop sustainably, start-up projects must start from local values, that is inevitable. But that value must be enhanced by knowledge, technology and synchronous market connections. If this can be done, local start-ups will not only escape from small scale, but also be able to compete in large markets,” Mr. Sinh emphasized.

Source: https://baoquangnam.vn/can-mo-nut-that-nguon-luc-doi-voi-chu-the-khoi-nghiep-tu-tai-nguyen-ban-dia-3152710.html