Conference seeks ways to step up food exports to African market

Rice is the major export product of Vietnam to Africa. Illustrative image (Source: VNA)

Hanoi (VNA) – A Vietnam-Africaonline trade exchange conference was held on June 14 by the Vietnam Trade PromotionAgency (Vietrade) under the Ministry of Industry and Trade in collaborationwith Vietnam Trade Offices in African countries, aiming to help Vietnamesebusinesses, localities and cooperatives seek partnerships to boost foodexports to the African market.

According to Vietrade Vice Director NguyenThi Thu Thuy, African countries' demand for food, especially rice, ishigh and diverse. She underlined Vietnam’s opportunities to provide many foodproducts to the nearly 1.4-million-strong market.

Statistics showed that in the first fivemonths of 2022, Vietnam shipped 2.38 million USD worth of the products toAlgeria. Rice was the major export product of Vietnam to Africa, whichaccounted for 20 percent of total export revenue generated from the market,which is also a promising land for Vietnamese coffee and peppercorn.

Each year, African countries spend about750 million USD on importing coffee, said Thuy, noting that Vietnam has beenone of the five major suppliers of the product in Africa.

Hoang Duc Nhuan, Vietnamese Trade Councilor in Algeria, said that Vietnamesecoffee is accounting for 50 percent of market share in the country. However, Vietnam isfacing fierce competition from China, Thailand, India, Pakistan and othercountries that have signed free trade agreements with Algeria. The situation issimilar in other markets in the African region, he said.

Nhuan held that high logistics costs are a big problem for Vietnam, along withdifferences in consumers’ habits and quality standards.

Tran Hung Cuong from the Vietnamese Trade Office in Nigeria said that in thefirst five months of this year, Vietnam earned 62.94 million USD from theNigerian market, up 10.3 percent year on year. However, the value of foodexports in the market has remained modest, he noted.

Experts at the event reminded Vietnamese exporters to pay greater attention to transportand preservation stages when exporting goods to Africa.

They advised Vietnamese firms to carefully studythe market as well as legal regulations in each country and information of itspartners to avoid risks, while choosing safe payment methods.

At the same time, they underlined the need for exporters to ensure that theirproducts meet particular requirements in each market./.

VNA