An online ad on home delivery from Shopee, a leading e-commerce platform in Vietnam, during last year's lockdown. (Photo courtesy of Shopee) A forecast by the Ministry of Industry and Commerce said by 2025, domesticsales are to account for 13.5 percent of the country's GDP with sales ofproducts and services to increase by 9 to 9.5 percent annually.
Sales of products and services for 2021 reached nearly 4,800 trillion VND,a 3.8 percent decrease from the previous year. Sales of non-essentials,including real estate and jewellery, suffered disproportionately while sales ofessential remained strong amid the pandemic.
According to a recent report by the Ministry of Planning and Investment, thenumber of newly-established firms in November last year saw a sharp decline of15 percent compared to the same period the previous year, at just over105,000. Meanwhile, nearly 40,000 firms were shut down during the period.
The figure indicated lower competition overall during 2021's 4th quarter, whichin turn gave larger players an advantage in gaining market share.
The majority of firms who left the market were small players who were hit hardby the lockdowns while lacking the resources to sustain themselves, saidstockbroker VNDirect.
As the country entered another new normal phase with the probability oflockdowns and mobility restrictions remaining low, experts said retailwas set to bounce back strongly in 2022.
The industry's three major driving forces have been said to include digitalcommerce, electronics for work and study from home, and a shift inconsumer behaviour from traditional shopping to digital shopping.
A recent paper released by Facebook and Bain & Company said consumershad been spending more money on digital commerce, a trend associated withincreased time spent on browsing and studying products online beforepurchases.
According to iPrice, during the third quarter last year, 77.8 million visitswere recorded on Shopee and 21.4 million visits on Lazada, two of the mostpopular digital commerce sites in Vietnam, making them the most effectiveplatforms for retailers to reach consumers, especially those who have wellestablished their online sales.
Phone retailers enjoyed an unexpected boom in sales in 2021 after the marketreached a saturation point since 2019 as demand soared and the governmentintroduced stricter regulations on imported devices.
This is a large boon for official distributors for big branches. In the marketof personal computers, experts say there is still a lot of room to grow as only30.7 percent of Vietnamese households possess a PC, while demand has been onthe rise as work and study from home became the norm last year.
The pandemic has also pushed consumers to move away from traditional shoppingto online shopping. According to Kantar Worldpanel, an international companydealing in consumer knowledge and insights, market share for brick-and-mortarstores contracted from 6 to 10 percent between August and September lastyear.
With the Lunar New Year holiday around the corner, demand for agriculturalproduce is expected to shoot up.
Dao Van Ho, director of the agricultural product sales and promotion centreunder the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, said localities andproduction centres had been working around the clock to ensure amplesupply for the holiday./.
VNA
