On September 7, 2026, in the Xuan Truong ward of Da Lat, Lam Dong Province, Vietnam, the pharmaceutical company Ladophar (Cong ty co phan Duoc Lam Dong = Lam Dong Pharmaceutical JSC) signed a linked-production contract with local farmers and is advancing cultivation-technique support and procurement at pharmaceutical-grade specifications. The artichokes grown by Truong Minh Hoang, who cultivates over 10,000 m², are shipped with leaves, flower buds, stems, and roots each allocated to tea, extract, or food ingredients. A mechanism that prices multiple uses from a single field, it becomes, for Japanese agricultural-product buyers and functional-material development staff, a concrete example of procurement design that does not rely on a single plant part.
Ladophar buys up the whole plant through a linked-production contract
Conventional artichoke cultivation cashed in only some parts, such as the leaves and flower buds, and returned the rest to the field or sold it cheaply. In this linked production, Ladophar hands farmers the technique from seedling to harvest and buys up plants meeting quality usable as pharmaceutical raw material, with specifications split by part. Under Ngo Thi Hanh, who handles raw-material procurement, Ladophar's sourcing area totals 50–60 ha. That the buyer grips the processing outlet first and builds quality from the cultivation stage differs from a mere sale and purchase of fresh produce.
The background: Da Lat's climate supports the artichoke production area
Da Lat is high in elevation and suited to artichoke growth, with fog, cool temperatures, and volcanic soil. In Vietnam, tea from dried leaves and extract (cao) have long circulated, and veteran processing companies have a track record of shipping leaf tea and extract to Japan and elsewhere. Scenes where Vietnam is chosen as a price-competitive production area are increasing. Examples of the administration supporting medicinal-plant production-area building are also emerging, and read together with Lao Cai Province's move to set an ordinance supporting medicinal plants a flow of locking down the upstream of raw material domestically comes into view.
Creating different outlets for leaves, flower buds, stems, and roots
At the core of this effort is the idea of dividing a single plant by use. The main outlets by part can be organized as follows.
| Part | Main processing / use |
|---|---|
| Flower bud | Food and food ingredients |
| Leaves | Tea, extract (cao) |
| Stems | Tea, extract raw material |
| Roots | Tea, crude-drug-type products |
What sells as fresh produce is mainly the flower buds, but preparing processing receptacles for leaves, stems, and roots creates multiple sales destinations with each harvest. As parts once discarded turn into raw material, the take-home from the same area builds up.
Harvest is about every 15 days for leaves; the full cycle is about one year
Artichoke cultivation takes effort. Leaf harvest comes around roughly every 15 days, putting out raw material through the year while working one field. The full cycle from transplanting to the end of harvest runs about a year. Where farmers are most on guard is the 1.5 to 2 months after transplanting; plants wither easily in this period, and the surviving plants decide the yield thereafter. Ladophar stations technicians and builds a regime in which farmers keep watching the plants from planting through harvest because the early survival rate governs the final raw-material volume. Lam Dong Province's medicinal-crop zones total 2,144 ha, and artichoke is positioned as a central item within them.
Implications for Japanese procurement and material development
There are three points Japanese buyers can draw from this case. First, a production area with specifications by part tends to have stable supply. Compared with a contract buying only a single part, a production area where the processing side takes all parts is less prone to farmer attrition. Second, raw material selected at pharmaceutical-grade specifications rides easily onto Japanese quality requirements as material for health tea, supplements, and beverages. Third, a production area where the processing company is involved from cultivation is easy to trace in history, letting you move Japanese import quarantine and labeling preparation forward. As an example of making a medicinal herb into a production area through contract cultivation, there is also the case in Khanh Hoa Province of growing a medicinal herb nearly wiped out by overharvesting into a contracted 40-ha production area and the mold where the buyer designs the entry point is common across various places.
Processing-premised production-area building spreads to other items
The mold of dividing a single plant by use and buying it up is not limited to artichokes. In production areas built around long-harvesting medicinal crops, as in Lang Son Province's example of opening a crude-drug production area with gardenia, planted once and harvested for 10 years a design that ties the rotation of harvest to processing outlets in advance is advancing. The move to secure unit price and volume as raw material, without being tossed about by the fresh-produce market, overlaps with the processing shift in coffee and fruit. For Japanese material development, room is emerging not only to buy finished tea and extract but to co-design outlets from the upstream cultivation.
Items to confirm in practice
When actually considering procurement, the points to confirm are narrow. You will want to ask the processing company early about how buying specifications are split by part, which parts can be used at pharmaceutical versus food specifications, the annual harvest calendar and shippable volume, and the state of compliance with Japan's residue standards and growing-area codes. Whether you bring it in as extract or leaf tea, or bring it in as dried raw material and process it on the Japanese side, changes the certifications needed and how to arrange lead times. Because it is a crop dependent on Da Lat's climate, factor in yield swings from weather too.
Summary
The linked production advancing with Da Lat artichokes shows a mold of extracting multiple raw materials from a single field, with the processing company building quality from the cultivation stage. Preparing separate outlets for leaves, flower buds, stems, and roots and buying up at pharmaceutical-grade specifications raises both supply stability and the transparency of history. For Japanese agricultural-product buyers and functional-material development staff, in addition to negotiating to buy finished goods, the option of procurement that gets involved from the production area's entry point is widening.
References:
Nong Nghiep va Moi Truong, "Da gia tri tu cay atiso" (September 7, 2026)
