CỔNG THÔNG TIN KINH TẾ VIỆT NAM

High trade deficit reveals ineffectiveness of import policy (30/05)

06/08/2010 - 27 Lượt xem

She said:

In May alone, import turnover was approximately $8bil, raising the total import turnover in the first five months of the year to $37.8bil. The domestic economic sector made the biggest contribution to the high trade deficit. Especially, the number of imported cars was very high despite the import tax increase decisions. It is estimated that 5,500 units were imported in May, and 35,400 units were imported in the first five months of the year, an increase of 6-fold over the same period of 2007. The figure includes vehicles with less than 9 seats only. Cars with more than 9 seats are not included as they are not considered ‘consumer products’.

Do the figures show that the policies on practicing thrift, reducing imports and increasing exports have been ineffective?

It is clear that imports have not decreased as expected; vice versa, imports are increasing. As for exports, in May, Vietnam exported $5.15bil worth of products, an increase of 3% over April. The exports made by the foreign invested economic sector increased more rapidly than the domestic economic sector.

In the first five months of the year, nine export items saw growth rates higher than the average rate of 27.2%. However, if calculating the export volume with the prices of the same period in 2007, the export growth rate would be 12%. This means that the higher export prices made a greater contribution to export growth.

Do you think that the import increases in the last time were because of speculation, I mean the actual demand was lower than the imports?

Your supposition could be confirmed if we had exact figures about the demand of the national economy. However, I can say that the imports of many commodity items, especially ‘sensitive’ ones, have been increasing very rapidly. For example, Vietnam imported 800,000 tonnes of steel in May alone, and the total sum of money Vietnam spent to buy steel in the first five months of the year was $4.1bil.

Meanwhile, more than 2mil tonnes of fertilser were imported in the last five months, worth $921mil, an increase of 164.3% over the same period of last year.

The government thinks that in order to reduce the trade deficit, Vietnam needs to boost exports. What do you think Vietnam needs to do to boost exports?

In order to boost exports, it is necessary to diversify export items and have key export items. This will relate to the policies on supporting industries development and investment strategy, which need a suitable and long-term vision.

Currently, Vietnam is importing a lot from China with the trade deficit with the market increasing by two-fold year on year. The trade deficit with China was 64.8% of the total trade deficit in 2007. Therefore, I think that we need to build up specific strategies to deal with the trade deficits for specific markets.
Source: Tuoi tre