Traders upbeat on new deals at Expo 2010

Turkey seeks after Vietnam’s wooden products

Deputy Minister of Industry and Trade Nguyen Thanh Bien (3rd, R) and the city’s officials cut the inauguration ribbon for Expo 2010 on WEdnesday - Photo: Thai Hang

HCMC – Many traders attending the HCMC International Furniture and Handicraft Fair and Exhibition, or Expo 2010, which kicked off here in the city on Wednesday morning, said they were optimistic about the number of contracts they would strike at the five-day event.

Dang Van Long, director of Dang Long Furniture Co. specializing in indoor and outdoor furniture, said he met several guests from the U.S., Canada and Japan on the first day of Expo 2010.

“Especially, there is one American retailer who asked for price quotations for big contracts amounting to hundreds of containers. I have participated in the Expo for years but have never seen such positive results right on the first day,” Long said.

Long and other exporters said they had faced difficulties in business due to weak purchasing power of key markets although signs of recovery had emerged since the first months of the year. The situation has forced them to delay plans to expand factories or develop new products.

Traders hence expect the fair will help them bolster business.

On day one Expo 2010 attracted not only international buyers but also local traders who came to get updated on the latest trends in the woodworking and handicraft sectors.

Tran Viet Tien, director of Gia Long Fine Art Co., specializing in home décor from poly resin, composite and foam, said he had many local visitors to his booth on Wednesday. They included contractors for restaurants and resorts.

In opening remarks Deputy Minister of Industry and Trade Nguyen Thanh Bien praised efforts by wood and handicraft enterprises to ride out tough times, saying this had helped push up the country’s overall export.

According to Vietnam’s customs, in the January-September period, wood exports increased by up to 37% from last year’s same period to around US$2.2 billion.

After the opening ceremony, which was also attended by diplomatic offices of France, Korea, Cuba, and the Netherlands, Deputy Minister Bien and representatives of the HCMC government awarded certificates of merit to the city’s 20 leading wood and handicraft exporters.

Expo 2010 will wrap up on October 10. On Thursday and Friday, there will be seminars on new challenges and solutions for the furniture and handicraft sectors, and introduction of a credit program by Viet A Bank to support enterprises.

Ten Turkish businesses are in talks with Vietnamese partners over the supply of wooden products to the country - Photo: Thu Nguyet

* Turkey was among several countries sending trade missions to the HCMC International Furniture and Handicraft Fair and Exhibition 2010 on Wednesday, and had business meetings with local furniture and handicraft makers at the event.

Selman Aycan, a representative of the Turkish Confederation of Businessmen and Industrialists (TUSKON) in Vietnam, said Turkey had a big demand for furniture, thus promising a new market for Vietnamese businesses.

He added that TUSKON is due to organize a trade mission for Vietnamese enterprises to Turkey next June. The market imports furniture, farm products, rubber, construction materials and garments from Vietnam while exporting steel.

However, furniture exports to Turkey are still modest. Statistics of the Ministry of Industry and Trade show Vietnam shipped a mere US$4.97 million worth of furniture to Turkey in the first eight months of this year, up 20% year-on-year.

Vietnamese furniture and wooden products imported by Japan and Turkey gained more than US$271 million and US$4.97 million, up 20.8% and 20% respectively.

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Traders upbeat on new deals at Expo 2010

Turkey seeks after Vietnam’s wooden products

Deputy Minister of Industry and Trade Nguyen Thanh Bien (3rd, R) and the city’s officials cut the inauguration ribbon for Expo 2010 on WEdnesday - Photo: Thai Hang

HCMC – Many traders attending the HCMC International Furniture and Handicraft Fair and Exhibition, or Expo 2010, which kicked off here in the city on Wednesday morning, said they were optimistic about the number of contracts they would strike at the five-day event.

Dang Van Long, director of Dang Long Furniture Co. specializing in indoor and outdoor furniture, said he met several guests from the U.S., Canada and Japan on the first day of Expo 2010.

“Especially, there is one American retailer who asked for price quotations for big contracts amounting to hundreds of containers. I have participated in the Expo for years but have never seen such positive results right on the first day,” Long said.

Long and other exporters said they had faced difficulties in business due to weak purchasing power of key markets although signs of recovery had emerged since the first months of the year. The situation has forced them to delay plans to expand factories or develop new products.

Traders hence expect the fair will help them bolster business.

On day one Expo 2010 attracted not only international buyers but also local traders who came to get updated on the latest trends in the woodworking and handicraft sectors.

Tran Viet Tien, director of Gia Long Fine Art Co., specializing in home décor from poly resin, composite and foam, said he had many local visitors to his booth on Wednesday. They included contractors for restaurants and resorts.

In opening remarks Deputy Minister of Industry and Trade Nguyen Thanh Bien praised efforts by wood and handicraft enterprises to ride out tough times, saying this had helped push up the country’s overall export.

According to Vietnam’s customs, in the January-September period, wood exports increased by up to 37% from last year’s same period to around US$2.2 billion.

After the opening ceremony, which was also attended by diplomatic offices of France, Korea, Cuba, and the Netherlands, Deputy Minister Bien and representatives of the HCMC government awarded certificates of merit to the city’s 20 leading wood and handicraft exporters.

Expo 2010 will wrap up on October 10. On Thursday and Friday, there will be seminars on new challenges and solutions for the furniture and handicraft sectors, and introduction of a credit program by Viet A Bank to support enterprises.

Ten Turkish businesses are in talks with Vietnamese partners over the supply of wooden products to the country - Photo: Thu Nguyet

* Turkey was among several countries sending trade missions to the HCMC International Furniture and Handicraft Fair and Exhibition 2010 on Wednesday, and had business meetings with local furniture and handicraft makers at the event.

Selman Aycan, a representative of the Turkish Confederation of Businessmen and Industrialists (TUSKON) in Vietnam, said Turkey had a big demand for furniture, thus promising a new market for Vietnamese businesses.

He added that TUSKON is due to organize a trade mission for Vietnamese enterprises to Turkey next June. The market imports furniture, farm products, rubber, construction materials and garments from Vietnam while exporting steel.

However, furniture exports to Turkey are still modest. Statistics of the Ministry of Industry and Trade show Vietnam shipped a mere US$4.97 million worth of furniture to Turkey in the first eight months of this year, up 20% year-on-year.

Vietnamese furniture and wooden products imported by Japan and Turkey gained more than US$271 million and US$4.97 million, up 20.8% and 20% respectively.

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Timber exports surge in major markets

The turnover from timber and furniture exports in the first nine months
of this year is estimated at 2.43 billion USD, a year-on-year increase
of 37.7 percent, according to the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural
Development (MARD).

The ministry reported that the total export turnover of forestry products has risen to 2.6 billion USD.

According to Vietnam’s Timber and Forest Products Association, timber
exports are showing positive signs, as orders for exports from now until
the end of the year have risen rapidly and many of them to the
country’s major markets such as the US and the EU are very substantial.

Timber now is amongst the top five Vietnamese exports, and the country is Southeast Asia’s second biggest timber exporter.

Vietnam now has more than 2,500 timber processing businesses, 2.8
times higher than in 2000 and 7.7 times more than 1990. The number of
non-State businesses represents 90 percent of the total.

Timber exports in recent years have increased sharply with more than
3,000 different items produced. Vietnamese wooden products are now sold
in 120 foreign markets, including the US, EU, Japan, Australia, the
Republic of Korea, China and Malaysia.

However, besides domestic resources, Vietnam also has to import a large amount of materials for the industry.

In the first nine months of this year, Vietnam imported 827 million USD worth of timber, down by 31 percent year-on-year./.

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3.8 million ha reserved for growing rice

Vietnam will keep 3.8 million ha to grow rice to ensure national
food security, said Deputy Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development
Bui Ba Bong on October 6.

Bong chaired a meeting to
review a master plan for the country’s rice cultivation by 2020 with a
vision towards 2030, to maintain the necessary acreage for the country’s
most important crop, as Vietnam is the world’s second largest rice
exporter.

The report delivered at the meeting warned
that the total acreage available for rice cultivation mapped out by
provinces and cities nationwide for 2020 and towards 2030 is only 3.68
million ha, down by 408,800 ha compared with 2009 and 120,000 ha less
than the target.

The Ministry of Agriculture and
Rural Development and the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment
agreed to re-adjust the planning of 33 provinces and cities, mostly in
the country’s two major rice bowls, the Red River Delta and the Mekong
Delta.

The report also put forward solutions to
manage and use the land fund, including State investment in rice growing
areas to improve productivity, issue encouraging policies for
localities to retain their current rice acreage and set up a price
stabilisation fund to ensure a 30 percent profit for rice growers.

According to the Vietnam Food Association, Vietnam is likely to export 7.2 million tonnes of rice this year.

In the first nine months of this year, the country shipped a record
5.55 million tonnes of rice, worth 2.56 billion USD, up nearly 12
percent in volume and 14.5 percent in value./.

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Vietnam’s exports to US continue to rise

The US Department of Commerce has announced that Vietnam’s exports to
the US in the first seven months of the year earned 7.9 billion USD, an
increase of 14 percent over the same period last year.

Garments
and textiles lead amongst Vietnam ’s major export items to the US ,
making 3.2 billion USD, a year-on-year increase of 12 percent and
followed by wooden products and furniture with 985 million USD, up 27
percent and footwear, 910 million USD up 9.6 percent.

Farm
produce is still one of Vietnam ’s top five leading export items,
ranking in 455 million USD, up 30.7 percent and seafood, 366 million
USD, up 5.9 percent.

Also under the reviewed period, Vietnam ’s
imports from the US were worth over 2 billion USD, an increase of
19.8 percent, bringing the import-export turnover between the two
countries to 9.9 billion USD, an increase of 15.1 percent over the same
period last year.

The Vietnamese Embassy’s Office of Commercial
Bureau estimates that Vietnam ’s export turnover to the US will hit
14.2 billion USD by the end of this year, a year-on year increase of 15
percent./.

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Apparel industry to achieve export target early

Photo: Reuters

The garment industry will achieve this year’s export target of US$10.5 billion by November, the Vietnam Textile and Apparel Association said.

In September, for a third consecutive month, exports topped $1 billion, taking year-to-date exports to more than $8 billion.

Since most firms have signed contacts for the rest of the year, exports will be worth at least $1 billion each month this quarter, VITAS said.

This year exports to major traditional markets have seen high growth. Exports to the US are up 22.1 percent to $3.94 billion, while shipments to the EU and Japan are 6.7 percent and 14.3 percent up at $1.18 billion and $691 million.

However, a surge in the global price of cotton has had a negative impact on the industry which imports 95 percent of its cotton needs. The price of a ton has risen 45 percent from the same period last year to $1,900-2,000.

Vietnam imported 260,000 tons of cotton in the first nine months and that figure is likely to reach 370,000 tons by year-end.

With the government setting export targets of $19 billion in 2015 and $25 billion in 2020, the industry is eyeing increased cotton cultivation and development of human resources to meet the increasing needs.

On the domestic front, in an effort to capture a greater market share, it is promoting trademarks and setting up distribution networks around the country.

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Economic recovery helps businesses increase salaries

Better business results and the recovery of the economy after the global
economic crisis are the main reasons for businesses to increase
salaries for their employees.

The results of a
salary survey conducted by Mercer, one of the world leading providers of
human resource consultancy services and Vietnam’s TalentNet
Corporation announced on October 7 showed that the average salary
increase in 2010 is 12.4 percent, nearly 0.2 percent higher than last
year’s figure.

Chemical and banking sectors saw
the highest salary increase of 13.9 percent, followed by the
pharmaceutical sector with 13.5 percent.

The survey, which was conducted at 253 joint venture and foreign-invested
companies, also reported that salaries increases were seen in almost all
businesses.

The rate of surveyed businesses
that did not increase salaries for employees dropped to 0.79 percent
from 13 percent in 2009. This shows that companies are now paying more
attention to salary policies as well as methods to attract and keep
human resources.

The voluntary resignation rate
in 2009 also fell 3.1 percent compared to the previous year to 13.3
percent, proving the stability of the labour market.

The Mercer salary report, which has been conducted in Vietnam
since 1999, provides businesses with bases to compare their salaries
with the market in order to put forth more effective salary polices./.

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