Workers of Binh Duong ceramics industry.

Affection for ceramics

Regarding Binh Duong province’s traditional craft industries, every one thinks about industries of ceramics, lacquer, and sculpture and so on. Through many up-and-down years of market-oriented economy, many local craft villages remain exist and reach impressive breakthroughs, especially ceramics industry.

Surveys on the local ceramics industry showed that thanks to advantages of materials, local ceramic industry has existed for about 200 years. The industry’s products have been attached to local people’s life and appeared nationwide and worldwide.

In its golden age, the entire province had over 500 ceramic workshops, placing jobs for thousands of laborers, exporting millions of products per year. Of this, most of workshops located at localities of Hung Dinh, Lai Thieu in Thuan An district, Tan Phuoc Khanh in Tan Uyen, Tuong Binh Hiep, Chanh Nghia in Thu Dau Mot town… From these localities, famous ceramic villages have appeared so far such as Tan Phuoc Khanh, Lai Thieu, Chanh Nghia.

Possibly speaking, through clever hands of artisans, thousands of ceramic products with various styles have helped create reputation as well as traditional character for Binh Duong ceramics industry.

The local ceramic industry has created famous artisans of Ly Ngoc Minh, Duong Van Long, Tu Trung Hieu, Ly Ngoc Bach… Despite difficulties of the industry, local ceramic artisans have made greater efforts to research and create unique products.

Up-and-down period of ceramic industry

In the 80s, the industry entered the most prosperous period. After that, appearance of countless products imported from Japan, Germany, China, Italia… made local products meet difficulties, owing poor competition of price and quality.

There were some workshops overcoming obstacles and reaching great development, thanks to technological innovation and product pattern improvement.

Traditional industry flying away

Indeed, from an initial breakthrough of productive technology of Minh Long I Ltd., a movement of using gas kilns across ceramic workshops has been developed, recovering the traditional industry and minimizing environmental pollution.

Not only equipment improvement, local ceramic workshops blow national soul into their products through images of buffalo, lotus, bamboo tree, Vietnamese mothers…

Many companies have equipped or improved modern facilities as well as learnt experiences from other nations to improve their products.

The local ceramic products remain existent aside from imported products. Even, the local products have appeared worldwide. At present, the local ceramic industry has yearly offered over 100 million of various products for the market, placing jobs for tens of thousands of laborers.

To offer conditions for the industry’s production and business development, the local authority and functional agencies facilitated the industry’s development by establishing Binh Duong Ceramics Association in March, 2010 to gather ceramic companies and material suppliers for the sake of competition in the integration period.

Especially, the all level agencies have prepared for the Vietnam-Binh Duong Ceramics Festival 2010 to honor local products and exchange experiences on ceramic production and business…

Reported by V.Huong – Translated by A.C