A Vietnamese food pavilion at the Vietnam-RoK cultural exchange in Seoul (Photo VNA) Hanoi (VNA) – Vietnamese businessesneed to get involved in the Republic of Korea (RoK)’s goods value chains viadistribution channels and pay more attention to positioning products and labeldesigning to build brands in the market.
Deputy head of the Ministry ofIndustry and Trade’s Department of Asia and Africa Markets Le An Hai said anotable feature in trade relations betweenVietnam and the RoK over the past 25 years is the supplementary import-exportstructure.
He named somemade-in-Vietnam products sold in the RoK such as coffee, pho, chutney, fishsauce and dragon fruit.
[Vietnamese goods favoured in RoK]
Though theRoK is a promising market, businesses face many challenges, such as strictregulations on food safety, quality of products and registration for productlabels, he noted.
Furthermore, the distribution system in the RoKis complicated with hundreds of supermarkets and tens of thousands ofconvenience stores, resulting in high competition, he said.
The Ministryof Industry and Trade is working to support businesses to access the RoK viaLotte Mart, Seven Eleven and E-mart, he added.
Vietnam isalso seeking to make full use of the free trade agreement with the RoK topenetrate the market.
Apart fromobeying regulations on quality and food safety, Vietnamese firms should focuson creating eye-catching products and study customers’ demand, Hai suggested.
Yoon Sang Ho,director of the Koran association of small- and medium-sized enterprises, saida strong brand will help enterprises secure market shares at home and abroad.
He advised Vietnameseenterprises to learn the Korean customers’ habits to increase their presence inthe market.
Trade betweenVietnam and the RoK rose nearly 87 fold over the past two decades to reach 43.4billion in 2016 from 0.5 billion USD in 1992. In the first nine months of 2017,the figure continued to increase to hit 45.09 billion USD. The RoK is the thirdbiggest trade partner of Vietnam, after the US and China.-VNA
