Agricultural scientist – Little-known story about Vinamilk CEO Mai Kieu Lien

During her 47 years at Vinamilk, this female leader has applied her knowledge, thinking, and creativity as a technician and scientist to develop Vinamilk from a solid foundation, contributing to the development of the milk processing and dairy farming industry in Vietnam.

Entrepreneurs born from science

Ms. Mai Kieu Lien graduated from Trung Vuong High School, then was sent by the State to the Soviet Union to study milk processing. During her training in Russia, Ms. Lien soon had access to superior milk processing technology and knowledge of advanced machinery and automation in the world.

After returning home, she held many different positions before being appointed General Director of Vinamilk in 1992. With a solid foundation of professional knowledge and talented management skills, Ms. Lien made many "historic" breakthrough decisions, bringing the Vietnamese dairy industry to new heights.

A typical example is the decision to restore the Dielac Powdered Milk Factory in 1988, which laid the foundation for the birth of the first brand of infant formula made by the hands and minds of Vietnamese people. Ms. Lien once shared that her university graduation thesis was “building a milk factory”. Perhaps at that time, she did not think that one day she would actually successfully restore a powdered milk factory that had been severely damaged and had lost all its technical documents.

From the understanding and knowledge gained while studying abroad in an advanced dairy processing industry, she boldly joined a group of Vietnamese engineers and experts to put 3 factories into stable operation after taking over: Thong Nhat, Truong Tho and Dielac. During this time, she also directly participated in researching and developing Vinamilk products such as Ngoi Sao Phuong Nam, Dielac... These are all famous brands, of high quality and trusted to this day.

In the 1990s, Ms. Lien and the company's leadership team continued to solve another difficult problem for Vietnam: always depending on imported raw materials. From building a domestic dairy herd, moving towards building a large, modern domestic raw material area was formed and changed the face of the dairy farming industry in Vietnam.

During her years leading Vinamilk, Ms. Mai Kieu Lien has maintained the "spirit" of a scientist by always researching and developing advanced dairy farming models in Vietnam, especially in building a system of dairy farms (TTBS). In 2015, Vinamilk had the first TTBS to achieve Global GAP certification. In 2016, Vinamilk was also the company that owned the first European organic farm in Vietnam.

At Vinamilk's dairy farms, for the first time, many technologies have been applied such as: herd management software via electronic chips attached to each individual cow, food ration management software, feed-pushing robots, automatic milking racks...

This is the result of a sharp strategy but contains the thinking of a scientist: Not only can Vinamilk raise dairy cows in a tropical country like Vietnam, it will also apply the highest and most advanced standards in the world.

Closely connected with farmers, focusing on "three agriculture"

A clear orientation in Vinamilk's sustainable development thinking and ESG implementation under the leadership of Ms. Mai Kieu Lien is the focus on the three-agriculture policy (Agriculture-Rural-Farmers). Vinamilk has joined hands with farmers since the 1990s, and through the process of building and sustainable cooperation, Vinamilk's TTBS have become the nucleus for regional economic development, with the link being farmers, thereby creating a value chain that ensures the harmonious development of agriculture and the lives of farmers in a sustainable way.

Recognizing that health and feed for dairy cows are the prerequisites to improve the quality of raw fresh milk, General Director Mai Kieu Lien requested Vinamilk's team to proactively increase technical support, support training for farmers on techniques, animal feed, veterinary medicine, etc., along with stable policies on purchasing raw fresh milk, helping dairy farmers cooperate with Vinamilk not only to have a stable income but also to improve their skills and gain more knowledge about agriculture.

Through many years of persistent construction and companionship, not only dairy farming households have benefited, but the ecosystem between farming households and Vinamilk has increasingly developed and connected. From purchasing, processing to production; Vinamilk and the households have created a chain of links with high economic value, helping farming households around the farm stabilize their livelihoods.

In the last 5 years, the biomass corn output of farming households purchased by Vinamilk increased from 66,000 tons in 2015 to nearly 200,000 tons in 2022. Households growing corn and grass supplying the farm are also guided by Vinamilk on good agricultural practices, increasing productivity, reducing production costs, contributing to improving economic efficiency.

Scientist Mai Kieu Lien is also interested in environmental issues. Understanding the inconveniences and difficulties of farmers, Ms. Lien always promotes finding solutions to improve the environment and quality of life in households and farms, aiming at sustainable livestock farming.

Under the direction of General Director Mai Kieu Lien, Vinamilk has implemented an environmental sanitation program, exterminating flies and mosquitoes, reducing odor-causing agents in livestock farms and testing organic carbon biological products originating from Japan at Vinamilk's bio-farms, then successfully piloted them at dairy farms in Vinh Phuc province and Moc Chau district, Son La province.

The results show that this biological product has a clear neutralizing effect on the environment, making the air fresher and more airy, making it difficult for flies and mosquitoes to develop. With the achieved results, Vinamilk plans to widely disseminate this product in livestock farming areas, contributing to improving the environment and protecting farmers' health.

Training talent, sustainable orientation, preparing for the future

Perhaps from her own experience, when she had the opportunity to access advanced knowledge of world agriculture, since 1993, Ms. Mai Kieu Lien has built a talent training program, sponsoring excellent students to study in Russia in the dairy industry. From this program, up to now, there have been 6 generations of engineers and experts in agriculture and dairy processing who have returned to work in the country and are currently holding many management positions in Vinamilk units.

Not only focusing on human resource training, aiming to develop the company towards sustainable development, since 2012, Vinamilk's Board of Directors has begun to publish sustainable development reports according to the GRI Standards and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Before that, this enterprise had advanced practices in sustainable agriculture.

Seeing the future and inevitable trend of agriculture is sustainability, Ms. Mai Kieu Lien and Vinamilk's Board of Directors have invested very early in systems such as: water circulation, waste treatment combined with biogas to turn waste into fertilizer, gas; applying circular economic thinking, organic farming... Many Vinamilk farms and factories have won awards for the environment and sustainable development such as Organic Da Lat, Mega Milk Factory in Binh Duong.