Vietnam’s exports still dominated by FDI firms
Workers at a manufacturing chain inside an LG Electronics Vietnam’s production plant in Hai Phong.
According to the General Department of Customs (GDC), as of April 15, exports by FDI firms reached nearly 10.87 billion USD, down 13 percent month-on-month.
Despite the fall, however, the sector accounted for 65.1 percent of the total export turnover this year (January 1 to April 15, 2017) at 70.05 billion USD, which marked an increase of 10.95 percent over the same period in 2016.
FDI firms in the country now have an accumulated 2017 trade surplus of 3.92 billion USD, making them significant contributors to national export value.
Meanwhile, Vietnam’s total export from the April 1 to April 15 was 16.37 billion USD, a month-on-month drop of 13.9 percent.
This took total exports for this year to more than 107.58 billion USD, an increase of nearly 16.76 billion USD or 18.5 percent over the same period in 2016.
However, the months leading to April 15 have seen a trade deficit of 2.56 billion USD, about 4.9 percent of export value.
On the other hand, Vietnam’s imports from January 1 to April 15, 2017 reached 55.07 billion USD, up 23.1 percent over the same period last year.
Accumulated import turnover for FDI firms reached more than 33.06 billion USD, up 23.7 percent year on year, accounting for 60 percent of the nation’s total imports.
The GDC report said the manufacturing sector will grow significantly with the opening of new FDI factories, on top of a record FDI disbursement of 15.8 billion USD in 2016. The construction sector should benefit in particular from higher FDI disbursements as also continued public investments in the energy and transport sectors.
The first quarter has also saw foreign firms add 7.71 billion USD in newly registered and supplemental capital. They increased their capital contribution and share purchases by 77.6 percent over the same period in 2016, with 2.9 billion USD for 493 newly registered projects and 3.9 billion USD for adding capital to 223 existing projects.
On the domestic front, export value for certain goods showed strong declines: steel was down 62.8 percent; computer, electronic parts and accessories, down 27.8 percent; textiles, down 20.4 percent; wood products, down 23.8 percent.
Only a few goods showed improvement in export value. Rice was up 6.5 percent and mobile devices and accessories went up three percent.
