The European Union (EU) has become the biggest trade partner of Vietnam as it makes up 17 per cent of the country’s foreign trade, local media reported.
In the first half, two-way trade between Vietnam and the EU reached over US$6.7 billion, up 26.2 per cent on year.
Vietnam-EU trade made record revenue of US$8.1 billion in 2005, seeing 27 times soaring against 1990 and doubling the figure of the year 2000.
Vietnam’s exports to the EU surpassed US$7 billion in 2006, up 2.5 times over that in the year 2000, while imports from the bloc were estimated at US$3 billion or 2.4 times higher than the figure of 2000.
The country’s main exports to the EU include footwear, apparel, seafood, fine arts, bicycles, coffee and tea.
Footwear became the biggest cash earner in 2006 with turnover of almost US$2 billion; followed by apparel with over US$1.24 billion.
Germany, the UK, France and Holland have been Vietnam’s largest export markets for years with annual growth rates estimated at between 20 per cent and 30 per cent. Meanwhile, the country is expanding its exports to new markets of Spain and Greece.
Vietnam’s major imports from the bloc include equipment, machinery, technology, garment and textile materials and accessories, steel, pharmaceuticals, chemicals and chemical products.
The preferential tax policies by the two sides for years have been mainly attributed to the impressive bilateral trade growth, said Dinh Van Hoi, deputy head of the Europe Department under the Ministry of Industry and Trade.
Vietnam and the EU have signed a number of deals since the two sides inked a framework agreement in 1975, such as a master plan on Vietnam-EU relations, the Garment and Textile Agreement, an accord on footwear trade fraud control and an agreement on market approaches, he said.
However, the barriers do still stand in the way of bilateral trade as the EU is imposing tough conditions on labor, environment and anti-dumping cases and ignoring Vietnam’s development level in bilateral negotiations on the opening of markets, Hoi said. (VNA)
Vietnamese
