AEC - the key to boost Vietnam’s exports

Bilateral trade ties between Vietnam and other ASEAN countries are increasingly developing with the 4.5-fold growth in total trade turnover from US$8.9 billion in 2003 to US$40 billion in 2013, Pham Thi Hong Thanh, Deputy Head of the MoIT's Asia-Pacific Department said.

Exports to these markets is expected to continue to grow steadily as more than 99 percent of tax lines of six ASEAN countries – Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand – will be slashed to zero in 2015 under the ASEAN Trade in Goods Agreement (ATIGA) signed on February 26th2009 in Thailand. This will provide a big opportunity for Vietnam to improve its trade balance, Thanh added.

ASEAN is one of Vietnam's leading trade partners, accounting for 15 percent of the country's total trade value (statistics in 2013). In 2013, the region made up 22.4 percent of Vietnam's total foreign direct investment (FDI) capital with Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand being key investors, Deputy Minister of MoIT Do Thang Hai said.

AEC and free trade agreements (FTAs) have contributed to promoting Vietnam's exports to ASEAN and ASEAN's partners as well as expanding Vietnam's market share in other markets, Hai stressed.

According to the Ministry of Industry and Trade (MoIT), the country imports tens of billions of US dollars worth of goods annually, mostly machinery, equipments and products for human consumption. Its import value hit US$113.79 billion in 2012 and increased to US$132.12 billion in 2013.

Vietnam always runs a huge deficit with China in goods trade, with import surplus from the market rising from only US$210 million in 2001 to a staggering figure of US$23.8 billion in 2013.

Thus, boosting exports to main markets such as the U.S., EU and ASEAN plays an important role in reducing Vietnam's trade deficit.