(VEN) – Once more, the quality and the structure of Vietnamese exports have been considered as the biggest hindrance to reducing the deficit in Vietnam-China trade.
Despite common difficulties facing both economies, Chinese exports to Vietnam, especially from the city of Chongzuo, Guangxi, China, continued to increase. Huang Mi Xin, a leader of the city, said that in 2012, exports from Chongzuo to Vietnam reached US$6.64 billion, accounting for 70.7 percent of the total export value of the city. Huang Mi Xin believed this year exports from the city to Vietnam would grow 20 percent compared with 2012 and growth would be maintained to 2015.
Huang Mi Xin affirmed that Chongzuo was the largest Chinese importer of Vietnamese goods. Last year, Chongzuo imported US$234 million worth of Vietnamese goods, but since the beginning of 2013, the import value had barely increased. “Currently, Chongzuo is seeking other import sources. The city wants to import more from Vietnam. However, we want to import more products which are of high added value while Vietnam mostly exports raw, preliminarily processed products to Chongzuo,” he said.
| China currently is Vietnam’s largest trade partner. Vietnam mostly exports agricultural products, textiles, garments and minerals to China and mostly imports machinery and equipment, electronic products, steel, iron and plastics. Bilateral trade reached US$41 billion in 2012 and is projected to increase to US$60 billion by 2015. At a meeting between Vietnamese Minister of Industry and Trade Vu Huy Hoang and Chinese Minister of Commerce Gao Hu Cheng in April, the two ministers discussed many measures to deal with matters related to bilateral trade and believed the US$60 billion target was feasible. |
Vietnam has a deficit in trade with not only Chongzuo but also China as a whole. It is difficult to reduce the deficit in trade between Vietnam and China because the structure, as well as the quality of Vietnamese exports, has yet to meet the demands of the Chinese market. In the first half of 2013, according to the Vietnamese Ministry of Industry and Trade, Vietnam’s deficit in trade with the world’s largest country in terms of population reached US$11.4 billion with Vietnam’s imports from China amounting to nearly US$17.4 billion, while exports to China stood at nearly US$6 billion.
One of the main reasons for Vietnam’s deficit in trade with China, according to Phung Quang Hai, Director of the Bidding Department of the Song Hong Joint Stock Corporation under the Vietnam Construction Industry Group, was the overwhelming role of Chinese contractors in large-scale projects in Vietnam. Currently, Chinese contractors handle 90 percent of bid packages in the field of heavy industrial construction in Vietnam. They brought everything required to implement the projects (machinery and equipment, technology and materials) from China, leading to an increase in Vietnamese imports from China.
The Chinese Ministry of Commerce’s Asia Department said Vietnam was China’s fifth largest trade partner. Since the beginning of this year, Vietnam’s deficit in trade with China has reached US$16.4 billion against US$13.7 billion in 2011. Li An, an official from the Asia Department of the Chinese Ministry of Commerce, said, “China itself is striving to balance its trade with Vietnam and really does not want Vietnam to have a deficit in trade with China. However, while China’s demand for high quality goods is growing, our importers can’t buy such goods from Vietnam.”
“If Vietnam does not change the export structure and improve the quality of export products, it will be difficult for the two countries to balance bilateral trade,” Li An warned and added that the smuggling of Chinese goods into Vietnam through land borders and airlines had led to an increase in Vietnam’s deficit in trade with China.
Li An said the Chinese Government wanted to continue to increase imports from Vietnam. The Chinese Ministry of Commerce has worked with the Vietnamese Ministry of Industry and Trade on measures to boost bilateral trade, especially the import of Vietnamese agricultural products, from 2013-2015. “However, Vietnam must change the structure as well as the quality of export products in order to balance bilateral trade,” he reiterated./.
By Thanh Tung & Hai Van
Đăng ký: VietNam News
