Wood export target set too high

Wood export target set too high

Vietnam saw an increase in the value of wood products exported for the first half of this year, but commentators don't expect the nation will hit its target of $4.6 billion exports for this year.

The Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development said the nation had a year-on-year increase of 25.9 per cent in export value of wood products to $2.3 billion.

During the first six months of this year, the export value of Vietnamese wood products surged by 35.3 per cent to China, 32.3 per cent to the US and 25.5 per cent to Japan against the same period last year.

However, Vietnam's wood product exporters still faced many difficulties, including impacts of the world economic downturn, technical barriers in import nations, high input costs and low competitive ability, said the ministry.

This year, demand on wood products in the EU market – accounting for 44 per cent of total wood imports in the world market – was expected to drop due to the economic downturn.

Vietnamese wood products exported to the US and EU must meet strict regulations on origin of wood and products.

Therefore, to gain the yearly target, exporters must look for new markets in the Asia Pacific, Middle East, Africa and South America where demands for the products remained high, the ministry said. Meanwhile, exporters said they expected ministries to come up with solutions to rising input costs or they would lose their customers.

vir