Hanoi (VNA)🍌 - Vietnam should implement polices to increase its exportvolume through its border gates with China by taking advantage of the Vietnam-ChinaBorder Trade Agreement, experts said.

Theagreement has created favourable conditions for Vietnam’s border provinces tochange reasonably their economic structure, they said. However,many experts were of the opinion that Vietnam should limit shipments of smallvolume of exports without legal contracts, and promote large volume of exports,as small-scale exports did not provide enterprises with incentives to improvethe quality of their goods and competitive ability. NguyenVan Hoi, Deputy Director of the Border and Mountainous Trade Department underthe Ministry of Industry and Trade (MoIT), said the trade agreement was signedin September 2016 with 16 articles to ensure an annual growth of 30 percent inthe trade value of goods exported through the border gates between Vietnam and China. Theagreement will contribute partly to the socio-economic development andimprovement of the living standards of the people in the border areas, he said.Vietnam’s major export goods to China include farming, forestry, seafood andfresh fruit products. Dinh VanThanh, former head of the MoIT’s Trade Research Institute, said the agreementwas applicable for trading via border gates and border markets in sevenprovinces of Vietnam, including Cao Bang, Quang Ninh, Lang Son, Ha Giang, LaoCai, Lai Chau, Dien Bien, and two China’s provinces of Yunnan and Guangxi. NguyenVan Son, Chairman of the People’s Committee of the northern mountainousprovince of Ha Giang, said the development of border gate economy and bordertrade is the key to economic development in Ha Giang province. To promoteborder trade development, Ha Giang has received recommendations fromenterprises to improve infrastructure, reform administrative procedure andcreate favourable conditions for attracting enterprises’ investment in bordertrade activities. Thanhsaid the infrastructure at border gates was limited owing to the lack ofinvestment, and the two countries have not had specific management policies forborder trade activities because of which those activities had not developedstrongly. Thereare not enough warehouses at the border gates between Vietnam and China to meetthe demand of trading activities, especially cold storage system, which has notgot any investment to be built. Meanwhile,some kind of farming and fresh fruit products of Vietnam have been exported toChina, but they were not exported under contracts. PhamVan Truong, a MoIT expert, said Vietnam should restructure the production offarming products and goods to ensure the quality of those products and promoteexports with large volume. This would help avoid "saving" farmproduce from plummeting prices that happened over the past time, partly due tosmall-scale and lack of legal contracts. TheState should have specific solutions to provide market and capital support toenterprises, said Truong, adding that the State should continue negotiationswith China to expand the market for Vietnamese goods by facilitating contractsfor large exports.

Thanh saidVietnam should establish a border business association to protect the interestsof local enterprises engaged in trading activities with China, as well as othercountries.
ജ TheGovernment needs to upgrade infrastructure for trading activities at bordergates, creating favourable conditions for border trade development, he added.

On theother hand, he said Vietnam must diversify its forms and methods of tradepromotion with neighbouring countries and perfect a database of information onborder trade activities for managing those activities.-VNA