Bilateral Trade Continues to Flourish
According to the latest report from the General Statistics Office, in the first seven months of 2024, the export turnover of goods to the US market reached US$66.1 billion, up 24.4% over the same period; import turnover from this market reached US$8.6 billion, up 6.2% over the same period. The US is currently the largest market for Vietnamese goods. At the same time, Vietnam is the leading country in Southeast Asia (ASEAN) in terms of exports to the US.
In the opposite direction, Vietnam is the 8th largest trading partner of the US and the 6th largest import market of the US.
Textiles and garments are key export items to the US (Photo: Can Dung)
Vietnam exports to the US many groups of products such as machinery, equipment, tools, and spare parts; computers, electronic products, and components; textiles and garments; telephones and components; wood and wooden products; footwear, etc.
In the opposite direction, Vietnam imports a lot of goods from the US, including products for production such as computers, electronic products, and components; cotton; machinery, equipment, tools, and spare parts; animal feed and raw materials…
According to Do Ngoc Hung, Commercial Counselor, Trade Office of Vietnam in the US, Vietnamese goods are becoming more and more popular in the US market because their quality is constantly improving, updating trends, and having competitive prices. On the other hand, changes in the supply chain as well as the wave of investment relocation have contributed to enhancing the production capacity of Vietnamese enterprises. This, at the same time, creates opportunities and room for Vietnamese goods to increase exports to the world in general and the US market in particular.
After nearly 30 years of establishing diplomatic relations and 24 years since the signing of the Vietnam – US Bilateral Trade Agreement (BTA), Vietnam – US trade relations have been a real bright spot. According to statistics from the General Department of Customs, Vietnam – US trade reached the milestone of US$100 billion for the first time in 2021 (reaching US$111.55 billion). Of which exports of Vietnam reached US$96.27 billion and imports reached US$15.28 billion. Since then, bilateral trade has always been over US$100 billion.
According to Dr. Vo Tri Thanh, an economic expert, the BTA is a good foundation for Vietnam to be more confident in international integration. Vietnam has revised and changed dozens of laws and improved the legal framework strongly. After the BTA, Vietnam confidently promoted deep integration, linked international commitments with domestic reforms, especially economic institutional reforms. The BTA promotes a process for Vietnam to gradually build an open, transparent, and non-discriminatory legal system to integrate into the world economy. Thanks to that, two-way trade between the two countries has grown steadily.
On September 10, 2023, Vietnam – US relations were upgraded to a Comprehensive Strategic Partnership. This milestone has opened up a lot of cooperation opportunities in all fields, including economic and trade relations between the two countries in the future.
Caution with trade remedy barriers
The Vietnam Trade Office in the US pointed out that although it is a potential market, the US is currently the market that investigates trade remedies the most with Vietnam’s exports. At the same time, it is also the member that investigates trade remedies the most among World Trade Organization (WTO) members with many other markets. Increased imports mean increased competitive pressure on US domestic producing industries. In this context, US businesses will step up the use of this tool to restrict imports and reduce competitive pressure.
Export industries subject to US trade remedy investigations range from low-value industries to those with large market share and high turnover. Typically, steel, seafood (shrimp, tra fish), machinery and equipment, wood, furniture, paper bags, plastic bags, aluminum… and recently paper plates.
Talking to Cong Thuong Newspaper, Dr. Le Quoc Phuong, former Deputy Director of the Center for Industry and Trade Information, also said that one of the biggest barriers to Vietnam’s import and export goods to markets in general and the US market, in particular, is trade barriers from anti-dumping measures. However, the positive point is that the authorities, especially the Ministry of Industry and Trade, have always provided timely information to businesses, especially early warning information on trade remedy measures by the host country.
Therefore, enterprises need to be cautious and, at the same time, establish close relations with the Trade Office of Vietnam in foreign countries, the Trade Remedies Authority (Ministry of Industry and Trade) to be able to grasp early warning information on trade remedy investigations to proactively have response solutions and maintain market share in important markets.
Recently, on August 2, the US Department of Commerce issued a conclusion, in which, although it recognized many positive changes in the Vietnamese economy in the past time, it still did not recognize Vietnam as a market economy country.
According to the Ministry of Industry and Trade, this conclusion means that Vietnamese enterprises exporting goods to the US market will continue to be discriminated against in anti-dumping and countervailing investigations by the US, and the actual production costs of Vietnamese enterprises will continue to be unrecognized but must use the “surrogate value” of a third country to calculate the dumping margin.
In the coming time, the Ministry of Industry and Trade will study and analyze the arguments in the Report on the Evaluation of Vietnam’s Economy of the US Department of Commerce, to supplement and perfect the argument to send a dossier requesting the US Department of Commerce to reconsider the market economy regime for Vietnam, thereby concretizing the Vietnam – US Comprehensive Strategic Partnership, thereby promoting economic and trade cooperation, investment, bringing practical benefits to businesses and people of the two countries.
At the same time, the Ministry of Industry and Trade will accompany Vietnamese enterprises exporting to the US market in anti-dumping and countervailing duty investigations to ensure the highest interests for the Vietnamese business community.
