Recently, the Ministry of Industry and Trade of Vietnam held a conference to evaluate the prospect of rice exports in 2016. Speaking from actual analysis of rice exports in 2015 and expected potential for 2016, Mr Hoang The Nang, Chairman of the Southern Food Association, believed that China would remain the main market this year, accounting for 54 percent of export volume; while the remainder would go to Europe, the US, Japan, Korea, the Middle East, Russia and the United Arab Emirates.
However, the export balance tipping heavily toward the Chinese market brings both huge potential and high risk. The most common issue is Chinese enterprises importing types of Vietnamese rice similar to China's varieties, then repackage and distribute those into domestic market under Chinese brands. This negatively affects Vietnamese rice brands as well as its’ value. Also many Vietnamese enterprises lack information about their partners, which leads to cases of Vietnamese enterprises being defrauded when exporting rice to China.
As for new markets such as the US, Europe, Korea, Japan or the Middle East, technical barriers are very strict, exported rice must be packaged and sealed properly; products must be of high quality and come from reputable brands. However, Vietnamese businesses are facing difficulty having no domestic agency providing quality certification of international standards. Enterprises, therefore, have to rely on foreign expertise, which poses a very high risk.
Recently, the Vietnam Food Association has proposed the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development to warn farmers against using some substances banned during rice culmination to avoid losing export markets, especially new ones. However, this problem remains unsolved till now due to a lack of detecting equipment. Authorities are unfamiliar with some of the banned substance also making the issue even harder to deal with. In fact, in 2015, some businesses had their export shipments returned after prohibited substances were detected in their products.
To minimise the risks for rice exporters as well as increase the market’s sustainability, Mr Tran Tuan Anh, Deputy Minister of Industry and Trade asked trade counsellors in both traditional and new markets to work with the Vietnam Trade Promotion Agency, the Bureau of Export and Import and the Multilateral Trade Policy Department to collect information about the markets, in which focusing on assessing Vietnamese rice’s comparative advantages against major competitors; proposing solutions to improve export efficiency and rice products’ added value. Localities to speed up support for the implementation of agricultural restructuring to maintain rice’s quality; designing plans to develop brand names for Vietnamese rice, stabilising raw material areas, connecting those areas with exporters; the Vietnam Food Association to complete development strategies for Vietnamese rice brands to create favourable conditions for the product to penetrate the distribution systems of export markets.
In the coming time, the Ministry of Industry and Trade will implement a project to help rice exporters improve their efficiency in human resources, marketing, dealing with international trade dispute; thereby creating the most favourable conditions for businesses to strengthen internal resources and diversify export markets.
PV
Vietnamese
