In Vietnam, the responsibility for food safety is a tangled web. According to Assoc Prof Dr Nguyen Duy Thinh, a leading expert in food safety technology, management is currently divided among the Ministry of Health, the Ministry of Industry and Trade, and the Ministry of Agriculture and Environment, covering the entire chain from farm to table. This fragmentation is mirrored at the local level, where provinces and cities have adopted a variety of different management structures.
HCMC, for instance, is the only locality with a dedicated Department of Food Safety from January 1, 2024, which evolved from a long-running Food Safety Management Authority. Da Nang City operates with a Management Authority model, while most other provinces have a Division of Food Safety and Hygiene.
“After a lengthy pilot period in HCMC, we still lack a rigorous, scientific evaluation of the model’s true effectiveness or its feasibility for replication elsewhere”, Assoc Prof Dr Nguyen Duy Thinh commented. “Without that data, it’s difficult to say definitively which model is best.”
This lack of uniformity is a major concern for federal officials. Deputy Minister of Health Do Xuan Tuyen noted that the different local models lead to “a lack of unity, difficulties in coordination, and overlapping jurisdictions.” He revealed that the Ministry is drafting two new decrees to clarify management authority and standardize the organizational structure at the provincial level.
The consequences of this fragmentation are real. Deputy Director Nguyen Hoai Nam of the HCMC Department of Health pointed to the fight against counterfeit food and drugs. “The coordination between agencies like Health, Food Safety, Market Management, Police, Customs, and Border Guards is sometimes loose,” he explained. “Lacking a single coordinating body leads to piecemeal enforcement, functional overlap, and slow information sharing, which undermines our effectiveness.”
“Unifying the food safety management model is a difficult but necessary task,” Deputy Minister Do Xuan Tuyen stated recently. He confirmed that the Ministry of Health is taking the lead in revising the national Law on Food Safety, with the aim of becoming the central agency responsible for unified state management of food safety nationwide.
From a legal standpoint, a unified authority is an urgent necessity. “The current dispersal of authority makes it incredibly difficult to assign responsibility when violations occur,” explained lawyer Tran Minh Hung. “When a single product involves multiple stages from production to distribution, determining which agency has jurisdiction becomes a complex problem. This not only cripples enforcement but also creates ‘legal gaps’ where some violations go unpunished.”
International experience offers a clear path forward. Experts point to countries like Singapore and the Republic of Korea, which have established powerful, unified food safety agencies directly under the Government. This structure streamlines procedures and enhances accountability.
At the same time, the law specifically regulates the coordination mechanism for unexpected inspections and handling of violations in the direction of increasing administrative and criminal sanctions for acts that cause serious harm to public health.
The transition, however, is proving to be messy. As of late September 2025, some provincial Divisions of Food Safety are being disbanded, with their duties transferred to newly formed “Food Safety Offices” under local Departments of Health.
But as one provincial office head shared, the process is not synchronized across the country, and the legal authority of the new offices differs from the old sub-departments, causing confusion for those on the ground. “For our work to be seamless and effective, we need a single, unified model across all 34 provinces and cities. It would give us a common voice when making recommendations to the national Food Safety Department,” he urged.
Ultimately, the core challenge may not be the laws themselves, but how they are enforced. Assoc Prof Dr Thinh argues that Vietnam’s legal framework has become relatively robust, particularly since a 2018 decree shifted the focus from pre-market approval to a risk-based, post-market surveillance model. It creates favorable conditions for businesses but also increases their responsibility on the principle of simplifying administrative procedures, strong decentralization of power, and increasing responsibility for localities.
Particularly, Decree No. 15/2018/ND-CP dated February 2, 2018, detailing the implementation of a number of articles of the Law on Food Safety, has fundamentally changed the method of food safety management by monitoring based on risk, minimizing pre-inspection, and increasing post-inspection.
“The main issue lies in enforcement,” he proposed. “Post-market inspection needs to be substantive and effective. This requires serious investment in resources and personnel at the local level, and a stronger network of testing laboratories nationwide to create a truly integrated and powerful system.”
