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Exports fall by 22.2% this month
The country's export value went down by 22.2 percent to US$ 3.9 billion in February alone, and export volumes in the first two months of this year stood at only $8.9 billion, according to the General Statistics Office (GSO).
Le Minh Thuy, an official of the GSO, attributed the decrease in exports in January and in the first two months to the prolonged traditional Lunar New Year (Tet) holidays.
In the first two months of this year, exports from the foreign-invested sector reached over VND5.3 billion, including crude oil, which saw a 26.2 percent year-on-year increase. Meanwhile, the domestic economic sector saw a slowdown in exports, reaching $3.88 billion, or a decrease of 21.2 percent.
According to Thuy, in the first two months of this year, the country's exports saw advantages, as prices in exports increased in the world market thanks to the global economic recovery.
For instance, rubber prices rose by 82.6 percent and crude oil was up by 63.9 percent. Coal and rice increased by 59 and 25 percent, respectively.
Industrial exports saw handsome increases in turnover: Electrical wires rose by 99.7 percent to $168 million, garment and textile items increased by 16.8 percent to $1.5 billion, and wood and wooden products were up by 29.2 percent to $467 million.
However, the increase in imports at a value of more than $10 billion, or an increase of 39.6 percent, was also attributed to increased prices on the world market for basic commodities such as petrol and raw materials after the recovery of the global economy.
Of the imported items, petrol increased by 20.1 percent to $939 million, steel saw an import value of $616 million, up 34.6 percent, and paper and clothes increased by 5.6 percent and 9.3 percent to $102 million and $523 million, respectively.
The trade deficit in the first two months stood at $1.75 billion due to an increase in imports.
Thuy warned that the trade deficit would continue to return as the State Bank adjusted the exchange rate of the US dollar and the Vietnamese dong and there were no stable signals of economic recovery for the biggest importers of Viet Nam (The US and the EU).
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