Opportunities and challenges for agricultural products exported to China

China is our country's largest agricultural import market, accounting for more than 50% of total agricultural export volume. Previously, exporting to this market was not difficult, but this year things have changed, China has built high technical barriers, requiring stricter quality for each type of product.

Illustration photo: https://vietnamnet.vn

China's reopening has helped Vietnam's agricultural exports to this market gradually recover. In fact, exports of agricultural and aquatic products to China have increased sharply since February 2023. Many Chinese businesses want to buy large quantities of agricultural and aquatic products from Vietnam.

Vietnam's agricultural exports to the Chinese market gradually recover

According to statistics from the General Department of Customs, in the first four months of 2023, fruit and vegetable exports to the Chinese market reached 804.646 million USD, up nearly 28% over the same period in 2022 and accounting for 58.67% of the market share. General Secretary of the Vietnam Fruit and Vegetable Association Dang Phuc Nguyen said that the increase in fruit and vegetable exports to the Chinese market was partly due to the fact that in April, many border gates between Vietnam and China increased their operating hours each day to receive cargo trucks. This shows that demand from the Chinese market is very large after a long period of decline due to the impact of the COVID-19 epidemic.

Regarding agricultural products, in the first 3 months of the year, Vietnamese durian was not in the main season, so exports were still modest. In April and May, the supply of durian began to increase, and exports of this item increased sharply. In addition, Vietnam has officially exported sweet potatoes to the Chinese market, creating momentum for the growth of this industry. Notably, in April 2023, the General Administration of Customs of China approved and issued codes to 70 growing areas and 13 sweet potato packaging facilities that are eligible for official exports. In particular, dried cassava chips are one of the items with increased export turnover in the Chinese market in the past 4 months with an export volume of 411.84 thousand tons, worth 108.75 million USD, up 17.9% in volume and 11.2% in value over the same period in 2022, accounting for 90.31% of the total amount of dried cassava chips exported nationwide. Vietnam's coffee exports to the Chinese market in the first 4 months of 2023 reached 13.42 thousand tons, worth 40.38 million USD, down 7.4% in volume and 9.3% in value over the same period in 2022.

In April 2023, the average export price of Vietnamese coffee to China reached 2,940 USD/ton, down 1.5% compared to March 2023 and down 11.3% compared to April 2022. In the first four months of 2023, the average export price of coffee to the Chinese market reached 3,006 USD/ton, down 2.1% over the same period in 2022. Vietnam's coffee market share in China's total imports decreased from 23.96% in the first quarter of 2022 to 13.9% in the first quarter of 2023. Statistics also show that the export turnover of processed coffee to China reached 24.23 million USD in the first 4 months of this year, down 16.6% over the same period in 2022.

In addition, Vietnam's pepper exports are still under pressure due to low consumption demand. Vietnam's pepper market share in China's total imports decreased from 39.36% in the first quarter of 2022 to 29.75% in the first quarter of 2023.

However, in the seafood sector, exports to the Chinese market are falling sharply. In the first four months of 2023, Vietnam's seafood exports to the Chinese market reached 363.28 million USD, down 31.95% compared to the first four months of 2022.

13 official export items to China

Currently, China is one of the three largest import markets for agricultural, forestry and fishery products of Vietnam. As of the end of April 2023, the export value to China accounted for 20.9%, up 3.3% over the same period last year.

Since the second half of 2022, Vietnam and China have signed a protocol on official export of durian, banana, sweet potato, and bird's nest to the Chinese market, opening up new opportunities for products to penetrate deeply into this large market. According to statistics from the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (MARD), to date, Vietnam has had 13 agricultural products officially exported to China, including: bird's nest, sweet potato, dragon fruit, longan, rambutan, mango, jackfruit, watermelon, banana, mangosteen, lychee, passion fruit, and durian.

To officially export to the Chinese market, Vietnam should develop an industry development strategy and build a brand in parallel with building production areas and large-scale, concentrated specialized farming areas based on market signals.

Enterprises need to regularly update and comply with regulations on quality standards, testing, quarantine, packaging, traceability of the Chinese market...

Have a strategy on logistics, build warehouses to preserve agricultural products in border areas. This will help preserve longer, maintain good quality when the delivery deadline comes.

Products need to be of good quality to have a chance to export.

Mr. Dinh Vinh Cuong, Chairman of 365 Group, said that in order to increase export turnover in the Chinese market, agricultural products need to be of good quality and meet consumer demand. As for dragon fruit - one of the main export products to China, in addition to the requirements on quality and food safety according to regulations, export enterprises need to pay close attention to the needs of each stage of this market.

Although China is the world's largest importer of dragon fruit, from 2015 to present, the country's import turnover has tended to stagnate and gradually decrease due to the development of domestic dragon fruit production areas to meet some of the consumer demand. Therefore, if we want to maintain and continue to grow dragon fruit export turnover, producers and businesses must create greater competitive advantages in terms of price, sweetness, and color for the product. The same goes for the potential product of durian. Currently, China is expanding its exploitation from many sources with different transportation methods, so Vietnam wants to dominate the market and needs to improve quality, reduce costs, and maintain product reputation.

In the seafood sector, in the period 2018-2022, Vietnam-China seafood trade has grown the strongest among the main markets. China is currently the second largest seafood import market of Vietnam, after the US. Vietnam's seafood products exported to China are mainly shrimp, crab, salmon, squid, pollock, cod, and pangasius. Of which, shrimp and pangasius are among the main export products. However, recently, due to the decrease in exports of these two products, the total seafood export turnover to China has decreased.

According to VASEP, in addition to the products with decreasing turnover, dried anchovies exported to China are attracting great attention with an increase of 50% in the first quarter of 2023. Many other products have strong export value increases such as dried shrimp, frozen yellowstripe scad, frozen hairtail... This is also a suggestion for expanding export products to compensate for the turnover of businesses.

CM/www.dangcongsan.vn

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