According to the latest statistics from the General Department of Customs, in the first 7 months of 2013, Vietnam’s vegetables and fruit exports continued to grow with total export turnover of US$620.6 million, increased by 40 percent year on year. With this growth rate, the target of US$1 billion in 2013 is entirely within reach.
Until now, Vietnam’s vegetables and fruit are available in 40 markets around the world. In the first 7 months of this year, China topped the list of Vietnam’s vegetables and fruit importers with a turnover of US$170.2 million, Japan ranked second with turnover of US$37 million, and the US the 3rd with turnover of US$28 million. According to the Post-Import Plant Quarantine Centre of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, Vietnam’s vegetables have successfully entered difficult markets. Vietnam exports irradiated white flesh and red flesh blue dragon fruit and rambutan to the US; white flesh blue dragon fruit under hot steam treatment to Japan; white flesh and red flesh blue dragon fruit under hot steam treatment to Korea, irradiated white flesh and red flesh blue dragon fruit to Chile; irradiated mango or mango under steam treatment to New Zealand. Especially, blue dragon fruit exports to the US reach a large volume with over 1,200 tonnes/year.
According to Tran Ngoc Hiep, Director of Hoang Hau Blue Dragon Company in Binh Thuan, markets for blue dragon fruit are favourable and promising in the years to come. However, faced with strict requirements of food hygiene and safety in markets such as the US, Japan, Korea, EU and so on, it is important that businesses need to promote fruit trees in VietGAP or GlobalGAP model, focusing on checking crop insecticide to increase opportunities and improve exports volume.
Mr Nguyen Van Nga, Director of the Department of Plant Quarantine 2 said that from 2007 to 2012, Vietnam’s vegetables exports grew steadily with the average growth rate of 25 percent per year. In 2007, the turnover of vegetables exports only reached US$305 million; in 2008, US$ 407 million; in 2011, US$ 628 million, and 2012, US$829. A good sign is that the hard markets have started ” open up” for Vietnamese fruit such as rambutan and blue dragon fruit. For blue dragon fruit, since the US applied quarantine in 2008, until now, blue dragon fruit exported to this market has been grown similar to those in the markets of Japan, South Korea which also have a notable increase.
However, the biggest difficulty for fruit and vegetable export is food safety. Currently the facilities certified by VietGAP are too few so businesses have to buy goods without VietGAP guarantee which leads to the lack of fruits and vegetables quality, increases the risk of exports particularly in the harsh markets. In addition, vegetables businesses are in small scale, operating unstably and vulnerable to economic crisis. The situation of unfair competition is pretty common, so after a short time, many vegetable exporters suffer from losses or even go bankrupt.
According to the Vietnam Fruit Association (Vinafruit), Vietnam’s vegetables have great potential for exports and world vegetable demand is expected to continue to increase from 3.5 to 5 percent, accordingly, the industry set export target of US$1 billion in 2013. It can be seen that with this growth rate and current markets, it is not difficult to achieve the goal of US$1 billion if the sector has clear orientation and strategy for the remaining months of the year to focus on building specialized areas such as blue dragon fruit area in Binh Thuan, lychee area in Bac Giang and vegetables area in Da Lat. In addition, exporters need to make efforts to improve competitiveness, preserve better harvest to ensure product quality standards and food safety.
Mr Huynh Quang Dau, Vice President of Vinafruit confirmed that if exporters unite to overcome difficulties, the goal of US$1 billion for vegetables and fruit exports is quite feasible. The key issue now is to raise awareness of farmers, businesses, cooperatives and institutions of production, processing, consumption and export of vegetables to ensure food safety and hygiene in order to meet the demanding requirements of the market. The implementation of regulations on food hygiene and safety is one of important factors to build sustainability for Vietnam vegetable commodities in the international arena.
Thanh Thao
Đăng ký: VietNam News
