Minister of Industry and Trade Vu Huy Hoang has reaffirmed it in an interview with the press.

- Export activities have been recognized as the striking point of Vietnam’s economy in 2011, so please, would you give the general judgment of the import-export situation in 2011?

Minister Vu Huy Hoang: in 2011, the economy in the world and at home had met with a lot of difficulties and challenges, yet import-export activities had vigorously developed and recorded a lot of positive achievements.

Minister of Industry and Trade Vu Huy Hoang

According to the official figures of the General Department of Customs, export turnover of 2011 reached USD 96.91 billion, a year-on-year 34.2% increase, the highest ever, while import turnover was put at USD 106.75% billion. This is the first time Vietnam’s import-export turnover had reached over USD 200 billion, occupying the fifth position of the ASEAN block in terms of foreign trade turnover.

That export had increased sharply in 2011 was contributed by the groups of items of goods, by both quantity and prices and by the export markets. In 2011, we had another two items of goods that had reached export turnover of over USD 1 billion, including hand bags, suitcases, hats, umbrellas and steel products, thus raising the total number of goods items with over USD 1 billion to 22, in which the groups of goods that had reached export turnover of over USD 6 billion include garments, crude oil, fisheries, foot wears, mobile phones and accessories.

Trade balance had been markedly improved thanks to the export growth that was higher than import growth. Trade deficit had been controlled at a level of USD 9.84 billion, the lowest in the past 10 years and much lower than the target of 18% set by the Resolution of the National Assembly and the target of 16% set by the Government to strive to achieve.

- Would you please talk about the export target in 2012? For the immediate, what areas does the Ministry of Industry and Trade concentrate on?

Minister Vu Huy Hoang: Our export activities in 2912 will probably meet with a lot more of difficulties and challenges than in 2011. Apart from the difficulties at home in terms of inflation, high banking rate, limited accessibility of capital, the world’s economic crisis will probably make a negative impact on export of Vietnam. The public debt has been ever more expanding with an ever stronger intensity in the eurozone, starting from Greece and spreading to Spain, Portugal and Italy. On the other hand, such the world leading economies as Germany and France have also been hard hit by this crisis.

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Export turnover target for 2012 is set to increase by 13% as mentioned in the Resolution of the second session of the National Assembly, 8th legislature. It means that export turnover in 2012 should reach USD 108.8 billion, a USD 12.5 billion increase in terms of absolute value.

In the current situation that this target is to be met will probably meet with difficulties because firstly, prices of goods and commodities can find it so hard to increase in 2012 due to the fact that prices of many items of agricultural, forestry, fisheries, fuel and mineral goods were already raised high in 2011; secondly, the world’s economy could fall into crisis, landing the requirements of consumption and goods in the world into a declining state; thirdly, domestic difficulties such as inflation and high banking rate will continue to make an impact on expansion and acceleration of production and export of businesses.

In face of the new developments of the world’s economic situation, to materialize the objectives and tasks set by the National Assembly for 2012 to push ahead export and curb on trade deficit, the Ministry of Industry and Trade will continue to coordinate with the ministries and sectors and industrial associations to implement the solutions in order to overcome difficulties to push ahead production, business and export with focusing on 5 main points:

Firstly, being proactive in coordinating with the relevant ministries and sectors such as the Finance Ministry, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development and the State Bank of Vietnam, making proposals to the Government to have committed solutions in order to give practical and suitable support to each item of export goods with a view to further promoting the possibility of infiltrating the world’s market and raising the competition and export effectiveness of such advantage products as those of the processing agriculture and industry;

Secondly, being proactive in coordinating with the Finance Ministry to deploy effectively the Decree No. 75/2011/ND-CP on August 30, 2011 of the Government in terms of investment credit and export credit of the State, making a contribution to supporting export businesses to get access to the source of export credit, reducing difficulties in terms of capital in the situation that there are still a lot of difficulties in the financial and credit areas;

Thirdly, renovation and raising of the effect of trade promotion activities in the direction of focusing on developing new export products with competitive advantage with no limitation of the export market and producing the items of goods that could meet the requirements at home;

Fourthly, intensifying the export insurance and credit activities in order to insure the risks for export businesses;

Fifthly, organizing effectively and synchronously the information activities and forecast of the market situation at home and abroad with a view to helping businesses to raise the possibility of competition, reduce the risks and infiltrate into the market effectively and making the full use of the opportunities from FTAs.

- In face of the continuous public debt crisis in Europe, do you think our export in 2012 can be affected and meet with difficulties? Would you please say something about how to overcome them?

Minister Vu Huy Hoang: The public debt has been developing ever more complicatedly in Europe and we should not be subjective about its affect on Vietnam’s export in this market. In 2009, when the global financial crisis happened, Vietnam’s total export turnover had been reduced by 8.9%, in which exports to the EU market had seen the strongest reduction of 13.7%, whereas, the US market – the centre of the financial crisis – Vietnam’s exports had been down to 4.3% only.

The economic crisis in Europe has affected almost all the importers in terms of capital flow with all the banks tightening their credit. Many big businesses have been hit with lowered lending rates, while smaller businesses have been suspended with lending.

At present, we have exported to Europe with many items of goods such as fisheries, coffee, pepper, garments and foot wears. These are the essential goods, so there will be not so much reduction of consumption even though there is crisis. However, the prices of these items of goods will be cut, thus making an impact on our export turnover.

To reduce the risks in this market, businesses should make constant review of their debts and customers and control closely the clauses of their contracts. On the other hand, apart from the traditional markets, businesses should also exploit further the potentials of the border trade. Now the neighborhood markets like Cambodia, Laos and China are making considerable contributions to Vietnam’s export turnover. However, in recent time Vietnam is yet to make the best use of the potential export in this market.

In face of the new development of the world situation, to implement the targets and tasks of pushing ahead export, curbing on trade deficit set by the National Assembly for 2012, the Ministry of Industry and Trade will coordinate with the ministries and sectors to concentrate on implementing the solutions to overcome difficulties with a view to pushing ahead production, business and export. On the part of businesses, it is necessary for them to be proactive in updating information at home and abroad, grasping the opportunities, overcoming difficulties and reporting in time to the State agencies the difficulties they can not be able to over and pushing ahead export.