October 29, 2012

Vietnam's agricultural, seafood exports up 9.5%

The export value of Vietnam's agricultural products and seafood has increased 9.5 % on-year to US$22.5 billion.

According to Nguyen Viet Chien, Director of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development's Information and Statistics Centre, the export value of forestry products had the biggest on-year surge, growing 18.3% to US$4 billion. Major agricultural products followed with an on-year increase of 7.7% to US$12.2 billion, as did seafood, which floated up 1.7% in export value to US$5 billion.

Chien said the increases were due to a surge in export volume but not value, although most of the products' export prices on the world market went up.

Seven products gained billions of US dollars, including seafood, rice, coffee, rubber, wooden products, cassava and cashews, Chien said.

In the first 10 months of this year, seafood increased slightly in export value, going up 1.7% to US$5 billion. This was mainly due to higher export prices in the world market, according to the ministry.

Meanwhile, local seafood exporters faced tough competition from both domestic and world markets during the period, particularly given mounting fees and technical barriers, Chien said.