Facing difficulties in exporting fresh fruits and vegetables affected by the Covid-19 epidemic, Vietnam is increasing its export to the market, which is next-door but has not been exploited efficiently yet.
Considering a partner instead of a "competitor"
According to the Vietnam Trade Office in Thailand, in 2019, exports of fresh and processed fruits reached about 3.6 billion USD. However, Thailand also imported more than 3 billion tons of fresh fruit with a value of over 1 billion USD; and imported 850 million tons of vegetables with about 600 million USD from other countries. This shows that the export power of agricultural products also has a large importing demand for fruits and vegetables.
Ms. Tran Thi Thanh My, Commercial Counsellor, Vietnam Trade Office in Thailand made the point: “We should consider Thailand as a trading partner instead of a competitor. Because Vietnam is exporting many good agricultural products, especially fresh fruits and vegetables to Thailand. For example, we are the main exporter of dragon fruits to Thailand and according to the statistics of Thai Customs, Vietnam is accounting for 90% of imported dragon fruits of this country”.
According to Ms. Tran Thi Thanh My, in the past 2 years, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development and the Ministry of Industry and Trade have worked many times with Thai agencies on expanding agricultural products exported to this market. In the coming time, the Vietnam Trade Office in Thailand will step up the support activities for Vietnamese enterprises to expand exports into this new and rich market.
According to Ms. My, up to now, Vietnam has only been officially licensed for 4 fruits: red and white dragon fruits, mango, longan and lychee imported to Thailand, so there is still plenty of potentials to increase exports to this market. Especially, Thailand attracts a lot of tourists, only Bangkok in 2019 welcomed 39.8 million tourists. These tourists are not only consumers but also ambassadors to promote Vietnam's fruits and vegetables throughout the country through the Thai market. Thailand is also considered the processing center of Southeast Asia. Therefore, there is a need for the country to diversify its sources of raw materials for processing, including from imported sources that Vietnam can take advantage of.
Mr. Chaisak Ringluen, representative of the Agricultural Regulatory Office (Department of Agriculture of Thailand) shared that fruits and vegetables that want to be imported into Thailand firstly must comply with the standards. Regarding Thai agriculture, the two most important types of licenses are hygiene and epidemiology, and a certificate of safe epidemiological production.
Therefore, any country wishing to export to Thailand must closely monitor pest and disease risk analysis. Thai experts will come to Vietnam to evaluate the production and treatment of this disease. In addition, fruits and vegetables before being exported must be treated and comply with other requirements on packaging, labelling, etc.
Phytosanitary inspection is carried out very closely and if pests and diseases are detected in the inspection samples, the whole lot will be refused to be imported or destroyed immediately. “Not only a consumer, Thailand is also a country that exports agricultural products from Vietnam to other countries according to the quality standard framework issued by Thailand. We look forward to expanding our trade relationship with Vietnam in terms of agricultural products ”- Mr. Chaisak Ringluen said.
Exploiting own advantages
Recently, many Thai corporations have stepped up their investments in Vietnam. This is an advantage to boost exports of agricultural products in particular and fruit and vegetable products to this market. Typically, every year, the Central Group and the BigC supermarket chains collaborate with the Ministry of Industry and Trade to organize programs to promote Vietnamese goods into Thailand.
Mr. Paul Le, Vice President of Central Group commented: “The requirement of the Thai market is that they choose the best products in the world. Many Vietnamese fruits are delicious and perfectly meet the requirements of the most demanding markets. We really want to boost the import of Vietnam's fresh fruits and vegetables, especially lychees into Thailand. ”
According to some importers of Thai agricultural products, in addition to fresh fruits, Thailand has a huge import demand for vegetables, especially those they cannot produce or produce very little like: carrots , potatoes and a variety of herbs, etc.
In addition, there are many potential fruit products exported to this market, for example, there are businesses trying to export avocados. Because this is a Thai fruit that must be imported and currently the price of an avocado sold in Thai supermarkets is up to 70,000 VND. It is expected that with the participation of Thai importers in Vietnam, more fruits and vegetables will be exported to this market in the coming time.
Vietnam also has the advantage of exporting to Thailand and few other markets in the world have a large overseas Vietnamese community living in this country. Among them, many people own supermarkets, distribution stores and supply of goods, which is a favourable condition to market the image of Vietnamese agricultural products to the Thai people.
Source: Dong Nai Newspaper.