Vietnam agricultural product exports in so far in 2011 is witnessing positive signs, with most major commodities such as potato, rice, rubber, cashew nuts, pepper, and fruit reaching impressive figures. However, economic experts still warn about risks.
According to the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, in January 2011, national turnover of agricultural product export was US$1.6 billion, increasing 13.35 percent year on year.
Going for good prices
Among agricultural product exporters, the happiest one may be coffee enterprises and farmers, since this commodity has high export turnover despite decrease in export quantity. According to General Office of Statistics, the estimated amount of coffee exported in January 2011 was 140,000 tonnes, which made up January’s export turnover of US$266 million, increasing by 30.4 percent year on year thanks to good prices, despite reduction by 3.7 percent in the amount against last year. Vietnam Coffee and Cocoa Association (Vicofa) shows their optimism about coffee export potential in 2011 in the context that coffee price contracts signed by enterprises by May 2011 is US$ 2,070 to 2,080 per tonne, increasing by 48 percent against late 2009. As calculated by experts, if world coffee price stays over US$2,000 per tonne, this year’s export turnover could reach US$2 billion.
Similar to coffee, rice export is also witnessing many positive signs with export turnover of US$200 million, increasing by two percent year on year. Vietnam is estimated to export six million tonnes of rice this year. The Vietnam Food Association said efforts will be made to keep a good export rice price to reach turnover of over US$3 billion. At the same time, collection prices of 5 and 25 percent broken rice were in turn increased to US$520 and US$490 per tonne.
Meanwhile, rubber export price now exceeds VND100 million per tonne, nearly double year on year. In January 2011, Vietnam exported 70,000 tonnes of rubber, gained US$250 million, increasing by 28.8 percent in the amount and by 82.8 percent in the price year on year. Experts forecast that if this impetus remains in 2011, rubber may make a new record, gaining US$3 billion for export turnover.
Enterprises exporting pepper, cashew nuts and frozen fishery are also happy with good export prices. For fishery in particular, due to catfish being red listed by WWF, its export seemed to stop short. However, Vietnam catfish has been officially taken off the red list, resulting in strong recovery of catfish export. At the moment, catfish for material has been exported at the best price ever (at VND24,000 per kilo and can continue in following months). Vietnam Association of Sea food Export and Processing forecast that this year catfish export turnover will gain about US$5.5 billion, increasing by 10 percent against 2010.
As for fruit for export, one positive sign is in 2011, South Korea will open its door to Vietnam’s dragon fruit. Therefore, exporting enterprises are estimated to export 2,600 tonnes of dragon fruit.
Worries left!
Despite many positive signs for both exporting enterprises and farmers, experts warn that it may not last. The reason is that most agricultural products have suffered scarceness since late 2010 when collection prices increased by 40 to 100 percent, caused by strongly increasing consumption in the world’s market, contrary to scarce supply. This was one of the reasons behind the good prices for Vietnam’s agricultural products in foreign markets.
Despite increasing prices, according to many enterprises, the coming time will see price fluctuation of exported agricultural products when some countries come to their crops of major agricultural products such as coffee, pepper and cocoa. The buying price will then decrease. Farmers and enterprises are advised by experts not to retain goods for better prices, since there are risks.
Also according to market experts, in order to sustainably export agricultural products, exporting enterprises should foster investment in the processing stage, ensure that regulations on the manufacturing and production of such products meet the barriers to enter demanding market such as US, EU and Japan.
Meanwhile, according to the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, in order to have stable and developed supply of agricultural and fishery products for export in the coming time, the Ministry will continue to review and newly plan zones for growing materials, and apply VietGap standards on manufacturing mills with significant exports. The ministry will also conduct programmes helping enterprises reinforce and expand traditional markets, as well as promoting trade and exploiting new ones such as Africa, the Middle East and South America. This is a long-term strategy requiring planning for the right steps, aiming to increase agricultural and fishery product sales with the strategy of investing to develop them domestically. (DTCK)
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