Pottery production in Binh Duong: Successful thanks to the program of improving quality

Binh Duong is a province with a long tradition of handicraft products made from ceramics. The pottery villages in Binh Duong not only provide products to serve the needs of consumers, but also become a symbol, a cultural beauty in the eyes of tourists.

However, at present, households producing in craft villages are faced with many problems such as the ability to organize management, equipment, and financial resources, market knowledge, marketing skills, facilities technical and technological infrastructure … Besides, the product quality is uneven, the product design is slow to innovate … For the above reasons, it reduces competitiveness in the market, especially the international market. Therefore, it is necessary to have synchronous solutions to restore, develop and find new directions for craft villages.

In order to support ceramic producers in the province, Binh Duong province has implemented projects and programs to improve productivity and quality of goods for businesses. Since then, it has helped businesses improve productivity and business efficiency. Some typical projects such as the project to improve the productivity and quality of products and goods of small and medium enterprises in Binh Duong province; program to improve productivity and quality; support training and application of 5S, Kaizen improvement tools …

As one of the key units supported, Cuong Phat Company has well implemented the screening criteria – arranged – clean according to 5S and carried out maintenance to build a culture of the enterprise. On the other hand, through the application of Kaizen, the company has improved the kiln, implemented land recovery from sludge. As a result, the company saves more than 600 million VND of raw material costs annually, saving nearly 26 million VND/month on average for production costs. In sum, the expenses that the company has saved from joining the program amounted to more than VND 2.5 billion.

Another example is Chan Thanh Ceramic Production – Trading – Service Co., Ltd in Ben Cat town, which has participated in the project of Improving the efficiency of energy use in small and medium enterprises in Vietnam. The company has replicated the model in Binh Duong province with the energy-saving ceramic fired gas furnace, mobile furnace shell. By converting to burning with gas and improving furnaces, the cost of burning materials of the company has decreased by nearly 40% compared to the original burning with wood. Not only that, Mr. Chi Thien Ly, the production manager of the company also said the garden products, especially products with big designs (800 – 1,200cm) when applying this model, will give the dryness more uniform, better glaze color, and improved quality.

Currently, Binh Duong is one of the provinces with the most developed ceramic industry in our country with an export value of about 150 million USD/year and domestic consumption market equivalent to 70 million USD/year. In order for the ceramic industry to continue to develop strongly in the coming time, production facilities need to promote their available advantages such as skilled labor, production experience and availability of natural conditions… and at the same time seize the opportunity to receive financial support, technology or training to apply quality productivity tools. On the managers’ side, building a long-term development strategy is necessary in order to retain the tradition of the pottery production village, while ensuring that the technology is not obsolete and constantly improving its capabilities, quality performance to compete with other markets in the world.

Productivity and Quality Office