January 12, 2010

Vietnam's livestock sector hit by corn import duty hikes

The increased taxes on the import of materials for animal feed production, including corn has considerably affected the Vietnamese livestock industry.

From January 1, 2010, import tax on fish and meat powder and corn will be raised to 5% from 0% while import tax on fish oil will be raised to 7% from 5%, and wheat flour import tax to 15% from 10%.

The rise of import tax on corn and other materials will cause prices of animal feed increase, which will hurt the livestock farmers.

The move by the Ministry of Finance is aimed at preventing frauds in the imports of corn for human consumption, but experts said that the volume of corn imported for human consumption is very small compared to that for animal feeding.

In 2009, Vietnam imported 900,000 tonnes of corn for animal feed production as the cassava- and corn-growing areas dropped.

Lat year Vietnamproduced 4.4 million tonnes of corn, down 141,300 tonnes with corn-growing acreage was down by 11.4%, compared to that in 2008.