After significant export growth of 33.3 percent in 2011, Vietnamexpects this year to attain further growth for its major products,including textiles and garments, leather and footwear, wood products andseafood.
According to Deputy Minister of Industry and Trade Nguyen Thanh Bien,the country's total export turnover is expected to increase by 13percent, from a total 96 billion USD in 2011 to 108.8 billion USD thisyear. However, challenges remain in the export sector, he added.
The country's textile and garment sector attained an export turnover ofover 14 billion USD in 2011, enjoying a trade surplus of 6.5 billionUSD.
Le Tien Truong, Deputy Chairman of Vietnam Textileand Garment Association and deputy general director of Vietnam TextileCorp. (Vinatex), explained that the healthy market forecasts and theconfidence gained from customers were the main reasons behind the highexport growth of textiles and garments last year.
However, to reach 15 billion USD export turnover for 2012 will not be aneasy task for the country's textile and garment sector, as globaleconomic woes still plague major markets such as the US, EU and Japan.
In addition, production costs, including prices ofelectricity, water, fuel, workers' salaries and bank loan interest, areall on the rise.
To maintain its leading position,textile and garment enterprises must choose markets and productscarefully and become strategic partners with major material suppliers.
Leather and footwear sector
With export turnover of 6.5 billion USD last year, the leather andfootwear sector ranks third on the list of the country's top 10 exports.
According to the Vietnam Leather and FootwearAssociation (Lefaso), the added value gained by the sector was more than55 percent of last year's export turnover, a year-on-year increase ofat least 5 percent.
Diep Thanh Kiet, deputy chairman ofLefaso, said a reduction in orders from European customers (due toglobal economic woes) remain the biggest concerns of local textile andgarment exporters.
That is the reason why Lefaso has setout an export target of 7 billion USD for 2012. Kiệt said, at the sametime, local exporters had also refused low-priced contracts to avoidinconveniences caused by anti-dumping lawsuits.
"However,I believe that local textile and garment enterprises can cope withdifficulties in 2012 if they make wise decisions in choosing markets andspecific products for them," Kiet told Tuoi Tre (Youth) newspaper.
Higher potential for seafood
Truong Đinh Hoe, general secretary of the Vietnam Seafood Processorsand Exporters and Processors (VASEP), said 2011 was a very sucessfulyear for the country's seafood sector as it attained high export growthat a time when seafood enterprises faced difficulties.
Hoe said last year seafood enterprises had succesfully coped withchallenges by attaining total export turnover of more than 6 billionUSD, far exceeding the 5.7 billion USD goal set in early 2011.
Le Van Quang, general director of Minh Phú Seafood JSC and deputychairman of VASEP, said there were opportunities for the seafood sectorto reach a target of 6.3-6.5 billion USD export turnover set by theMinistry of Agriculture and Rural Development for 2012.
"It's not a very difficult goal to reach, provided that seafoodcompanies maintain the volume of goods to be exported to traditionalmarkets such as EU, the US and Japan, and establish new markets,including Russia and China," said Quang.
Higher quality rice
Vietnam earned more than 3.6 billion USD for over seven milliontonnes of rice exported in 2011. According to the Vietnam FoodAssociation (VFA), 2011 was a robust year for the country's agricultureas local farmers reaped bumper crops while rice prices soared in themarket.
VFA said Vietnam rice faces harsh competitionfrom Indian and Pakistani rice. To make Vietnamese rice morecompetitive, on December 21, VFA lowered the rice price with a floorprice of 5 percent broken rice at 500 USD per tonne, nearly 100 USDper tonne lower than the price of the same rice sold in early Novemberlast year.
In December, VFA affirmed that in followingyears Vietnam will not focus on increasing volumes of export rice,but will concentrate its efforts on producing high-quality rice to gethigher prices of export rice.
Thus, Vietnam will maintain its volume of export rice at six to seven million tonnes per year.
Wood products
Despite a total export turnover of 3.9 billion USD in 2011, Vietnamesewood processors are worried about the difficulties facing Vietnamesewood products in EU markets and the possibility of facing anti-dumpinglawsuits in the US, according to Tran Quoc Mạnh, Deputy Chairman of HCMCity Handicraft and Wood Industry Association (HAWA).
However, the local wood industry still has great potential fordevelopment if local wood processors can conquer new emerging marketssuch as the Republic of Korea , Japan and China .
To ease dependence on imported materials, Manh said local enterprisesshould use more local materials, especially cajeputs, which arecultivated in vast areas across the country.
"The volumeof imported wood materials is expected to drop if the Government issuessound policies on afforestation, which will allow more resources forwood materials," said Manh./.