Hanoi (VNA) – Within the framework of the Spring Fair 2026, the Vietnam Trade Promotion Agency (Vietrade) under the Ministry of Industry and Trade (MoIT), in cooperation with Alibaba.com, convened a forum on enhancing the competitiveness of Vietnamese export products, offering fresh directions for businesses navigating a rapidly changing global trade environment.
Opening the event, Hoang Minh Chien, Deputy Director of Vietrade, said as integration deepens, competitiveness in exports is no longer driven primarily by cost advantages or output volume, but increasingly by quality, added value and the capacity to embed more deeply in global trade and value chains.
Chien stressed that Vietnam’s export industries must move beyond maintaining growth rates to strengthening the substantive competitiveness of their products across the entire value chain. In reality, key export sectors such as textiles and garments, footwear, wood and forestry products, and handicrafts are under increasing pressure to adopt new technologies, improve quality and meet higher environmental and social standards in order to sustain and expand their foothold in major markets.
The forum was designed as an open, practical and forward-looking platform, bringing together policymakers, industry associations, trade promotion bodies, international partners and the business community to exchange information, share experiences and propose solutions.
According to Chien, the event went beyond information dissemination to help enterprises identify concrete and feasible pathways suited to the new global trade context. Through thematic discussions, participants examined market trends and export opportunities for key industries, solutions to enhance value addition and supply chain sustainability, the role of innovation, digital transformation and e-commerce in export growth, as well as practical models for brand building and international market expansion.
A key focus of the forum was the role of B2B e-commerce in helping exporters access global markets. As traditional trade channels face mounting barriers, digital platforms are emerging as vital tools enabling enterprises to connect directly with international buyers. In this context, digital transformation and e-commerce are no longer optional, but essential requirements for export-oriented businesses.
Through initiatives such as the “Vietnam Pavilion”, the ministry aims to support Vietnamese enterprises, particularly small and medium-sized ones, in improving market access, strengthening brand recognition and expanding sustainable business partnerships, Chien noted. The forum also featured a range of successful case studies in leveraging B2B e-commerce, especially via Alibaba.com, providing practical lessons for the export community.
By participating in the forum, enterprises not only received updates on market trends and export support policies, but also gained practical insights to enhance competitiveness in a more sustainable, value-added and digitally driven manner, supporting long-term and effective development.
Tran Quoc Toan, Deputy Director of the MoIT’s Agency of Foreign Trade, said that as global trade undergoes profound restructuring, import-export policies are evolving from tools for regulating trade flows into instruments for creating development space for enterprises to integrate more deeply into regional and global value chains.
He noted that 2025 marked a significant milestone, with Vietnam’s total import-export turnover exceeding 930 billion USD for the first time, including more than 475 billion USD in exports. This result underscores the economy’s resilience and adaptability amid global uncertainties, as well as the initial effectiveness of integration and institutional reform policies in the trade sector.
However, Toan cautioned that behind these impressive figures lie persistent structural challenges, notably the heavy reliance on foreign-invested enterprises, while domestic firms, despite progress, remain limited in their participation in higher value-added stages of production and export chains.
Looking ahead, he said policy priorities must shift from expanding export scale to improving growth quality, promoting deeper export development linked to technological innovation, higher domestic content, the development of supporting industries and the building of national brands for Vietnamese products.
Toan added that the legal framework for foreign trade, centred on the Law on Foreign Trade Management and guiding decrees, is being reviewed and refined to ensure greater transparency, coherence and alignment with international practices.
At the same time, the Agency of Foreign Trade is accelerating administrative reforms, expanding the use of electronic certificates of origin, integrating import-export procedures into the National Single Window and promoting digitalisation of management processes to shorten processing times, cut compliance costs and enhance transparency.
On a longer-term perspective, Toan emphasised that Vietnam’s exports can only grow sustainably if closely aligned with green transformation, circular economy principles and emerging environmental and social standards that are increasingly becoming mandatory “passports” for major markets. New mechanisms such as the EU’s Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM), together with regulations on carbon traceability and social responsibility, are prompting enterprises to comprehensively restructure their production chains to maintain their international competitiveness.
He underlined that state management agencies must go beyond policy formulation to actively accompany businesses by providing market information, issuing early warnings on trade risks, supporting the handling of trade remedy cases and strengthening training on rules of origin, technical standards and international commitments./.
