In the first quarter, Vietnam's rice exports reached 1.48 million tonnes, earning 715 million USD. (Photo: danviet.vn) Inthe first quarter, Vietnam's rice exports reached 1.48 million tonnes, earning 715million USD, up 24 percent in volume and 10.5 percent in value on year.
Therice exports to the EU in the first two months of this year recorded animpressive volume of 15,500 tonnes, earning nearly 12 million USD. The exportsrose almost four times in volume and 4.3 times in value compared to 2021.
Inthe bloc, Italy suddenly took the lead in the import volume of Vietnamese ricewith an increase of 26 times over the same period. In addition, there wereseveral other key markets such as Germany, France and the Netherlands.
Theexport price of Vietnam's rice to the EU recorded an increase of 9 percent to 755USD per tonne, while Vietnam's average rice export price fell 12.1 percent inthe first two months of the year to 469 USD per tonne.
Vietnam'srice export price to the EU was higher than the average price because the riceexported to this market was mainly aromatic rice with high value. However,Vietnamese export rice has still been unable to compete in price in the EUmarket against other competitors such as Cambodia, Thailand and India.
Accordingto MoIT, in 2021, despite being affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, Vietnam'srice exports to the EU reached 60,000 tonnes, worth 41 million USD. The exportssurged by about 1 percent in volume and more than 20 percent in value year onyear. For the first time, some speciality rice varieties of Vietnam, suchas ST24 and ST25 fragrant rice, were exported to the market.
Accordingto the commitments from the EVFTA, the EU gives Vietnam an export quota of80,000 tonnes of rice per year to the EU, including 30,000 tonnes of milledrice, 20,000 tonnes of unmilled rice and 30,000 tonnes of aromatic rice.Especially, the EU will not apply a quota for broken rice exported from Vietnam.
Theministry said Vietnam could export 100,000 tonnes of all kinds of rice tothe EU every year.
Besides,the EU will cut the tariff for rice to zero within 3-5 years from the date ofentry into force of the EVFTA. This opens up opportunities for Vietnamese riceto compete with other countries' rice products exported to the EU.
TheMoIT representative said that now, businesses have efficiently taken advantageof several incentives from the EVFTA to increase the rice exports to the EU.
Accordingto the Vietnam Food Association (VFA), in 2022, Vietnam's rice exports to theEU are expected to increase further, especially as the quality of Vietnameserice has been improved. However, enterprises exporting Vietnamese rice need tobetter take advantage of EVFTA.
Atpresent, Vietnam's rice accounts for only 3.1 percent of the total amount ofrice imported to the EU. This market imports 3-4 million per annum, accordingto data from the European Statistics Agency (Eurostat).
In2021, the EU imported 3.6 million tonnes of rice, 1.6 million tonnes weretraded within the bloc, and two million tonnes were imported from othercountries.
Meanwhile,Vietnam has not yet met the full rice export quota provided by the EU for 2021,thus still has plenty of room to increase rice exports to this market.
Oneof the reasons why Vietnam did not use all rice quotas is that less than20 percent of domestic businesses know clearly about the EVFTA, according toNguyen Thi Thu Trang, Director of the WTO and Integration Centreunder the VCCI.
Accordingto Trang, besides the advantages of the EVFTA, enterprises must also improvethe quality of Vietnamese rice and change their measures in approaching themarket to expand market share.
Withhigh and stable demand for speciality rice from Asia, the EU will be apotential export market for Vietnamese rice in the future./.
VNA
