According to the latest news from Vietnam Customs, by the end July, export turnover in July set an record high of US$9.3 billion, increasing by 10.2 percent against June whereas import decreased by 4.6 percent with US$8.22 billion. It means in July, Vietnam witnessed trade surplus of over US$1.1 billion, for the first time in the past 28 months.
Explaining for such an amazing figure, economic experts said it was the result of gold re-export in the past time. Also according to Vietnam Customs, export turnover of gemstone, valuable metals (whose representative is gold) and products in July 2011 reached US$1.1 billion, increasing by 38 percent against previous month. Therefore, by the end of June, export turnover of this group was US$2.3 billion, increasing 51.6 percent year on year. Thus, trade surplus is not nature of the economy whose has long drawback of trade deficit, which can be considered prideful achievement.
Especially in the past two months, the world gold market has continuously seen fluctuations and reached a record in past many years. When big economies like the US, EU etc meet difficulty, psychologically, people regard gold as the safest reserve. As a result, they rush to buy gold for reserve in order to avoid such current price escalator. This is also a factor causing the world gold market to be busy. Not being an exception of this principle, Vietnam also enters this market, which fast brings about profit and foreign currency. Actually, tonnes of gold, especially in form of golden cosmetic have been noisily exported through the border for the past three months when the world gold price continuously goes up. Vietnam’s key gold importing markets are South Africa, Sweden etc. This valuable metal speeds up suddenly. In first five months, this group’s export turnover averaged US$79 million per month while turnover from gold re-export soared to US$806 billion in June and set a record in July with US$1.1 billion. July’s figure is approximately equal to that in first six months.
Moreover, this good is also highly risky due to unpredictable price fluctuations. Trade surplus of US$ 1.1 billion is only price difference between domestic and the world gold market but not a sustainable factor. The proof is State Bank has recently allowed importing five tonnes of gold to stabilize gold fever. Therefore, it is hard to have a sudden change in Vietnam trade balance in last months. Head of Vietnam Customs also stressed that, trade surplus is stable for long term, which depends on competitiveness such as technology, human resource, fiscal policies etc. Inherently, Vietnam exports raw materials but import processed goods like machines, components, high technologies etc.
Crude oil is similar to gold in term of gold. By the end of July, crude oil export was US$847 million, increasing by 70 percent in volume and 75 percent in price against June. Crude oil increases by 83 percent in volume and triples in value (reaches US$ 2.9 billion) year on year.
Import also slows down at rate of 15 percent on average due to some import restriction policies, especially in automobiles, mobiles, liquor, cosmetic. Taking gold turnover on board, in seven first months, Vietnam trade surplus was only US$5.4 billion, percentage over total export turnover was 10.3 percent.
Concluding on the recent trade surplus, most policy makers and economic analysts all stated it was taking opportunity, which shouldn’t cause loosing in import management measures of Vietnam.
Le Hien
Vietnamese
