Two officials jailed for selling poor quality corn seeds to farmers

According to the first instance verdict on June 4 of the Hanoi People's Court, the Center for Transfer of Corn Technical Advances (Corn Research Institute, under the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development) was assigned to produce and trade LVN885 brand corn seeds.

Mr. Vu Viet Cuong (Center staff) is responsible for supervising production, harvesting, purchasing products and liquidating contracts.In mid-January 2015, Mr. Cuong harvested 60 tons of corn.

The first post-inspection results determined that the corn seeds under Mr. Cuong's charge did not meet the standards due to the adulteration rate of up to 22.3%. The second screening showed that the remaining corn seeds were only over 24 tons but still did not meet the standards (hereditary adulteration was nearly 18%).

Due to failure to meet seed requirements, all of this corn was not accepted.To recover capital, on August 7, 2015, Mr. Cuong submitted a request to liquidate substandard corn seeds, with a commitment to only use them for animal feed purposes.

However, Mr. Cuong made an agreement with Bui Duy Hoa (former deputy director of the Center) to “transform” more than 24 tons of substandard corn seeds into LVN885 and put them on the market. Mr. Cuong sold this corn to Mr. Hoa for more than 900 million VND.

Mr. Hoa hired packaging and printed fake packaging with the same exclusive brand as LVN885 for consumption.21 tons were successfully seized at 3 stores in Yen Bai and Lao Cai and earned 40.2 million VND. The remaining amount of substandard corn seeds seized was 954 kg.

After a day of trial, the court sentenced Mr. Hoa to 18 months in prison and Mr. Cuong to 15 months in prison for trading in counterfeit plant varieties.