Hanoi (VNA) – Vietnam is gaining a stronger footholdin the EU market, though the COVID-19 wreaked havocs on both sides, after theEU-Vietnam Free Trade Agreement (EVFTA) took effect in August 2020.

The high-quality trade deal has enabled many Vietnameseenterprises to stand strong through the pandemic over the last two years, LuongHoang Thai, Director of the Ministry of Industry and Trade’sMultilateral Trade Policy Department, told the Vietnam News Agency.

Vietnam’s exports to the EU increased 6.2% to 39.75 billionUSD in the first year after the EVFTA became valid (from August 2020 to July2021), he said.

Ten months into the second year of the agreement (fromAugust 2021 to the end of May 2022), the shipment volume soared 39.71% to 36.8billion USD, with significant growth seen in many of Vietnam’s key exportitems, for example, textile-garment (16.7%), rice (42.9%), pepper (81.3%),aquatic products (22.7%), and machinery (20.9%).

The percentage of Vietnamese exporters using certificationof origin to reap preferential duties provided by the EVFTA expanded from 14.8%in the first year to 20.7% in the second year, Thai noted.

He further cited that last year, Vietnam ranked 11th among exporters to the EU globally. In Asia, the country came fifth, only afterChina, Japan, the Republic of Korea and India.

It showed Vietnam’s heightened position in the EU market,given that it is a very demanding market with high quality requirements, he said.

Now the EU is also Vietnam’s third largest importer of agriculturalproducts. According to the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, two-way trade of agricultural, forestry and aquatic products grew from 4.3billion USD in 2015 to 4.5 billion USD in 2020.

The figure rose further after the EVFTA came into force,to 5.2 billion USD in 2020, up 15.56% from a year earlier. It totalled 2.66billion USD in the first five months of this year, a year-on-year surge of 26%.Vietnam’s shipments stood at 2,145 billion USD, up 36.6% year-on-year.

Many agricultural products posted double-digit growth,including coffee, aquatic products, vegetables and pepper, while rice enjoyed a triple-digit jump.

Preferential customs duties from the EVFTA have promptedVietnamese seafood exporters to drastically improve quality of their products,said General Secretary of the Vietnam Association of Seafood Exporters andProducers (VASEP) Truong Dinh Hoe.

The trade pact has made producers pay greater attentionto not only quantity but also added value of the products, he said, adding thatthey have been keeping in mind that the EVFTA remains a key for them to enterthe EU market.

Deputy Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development PhungDuc Tien said Vietnamese and EU products are non-competitive but complimentary toeach other and there are plenty of room for both sides to step up agricultural product trade.

Given that Vietnam has been actively participating in theglobal food chain amidst disruptions caused by COVID-19, Tien said his ministrystands ready to cooperate with the EU to foster trade facilitation, protectstandards and minimise trade barriers between the two sides./.