Vietnam Business News

Vietnam-Germany trade reaches US$1.12 bln, Jan-Aug
Friday - Oct. 22, 2004

Vietnam enjoyed a substantial surplus with Germany in the first eight months of the year as two-way trade jumped 22 per cent in the period, the Ministry of Trade said.

Bilateral trade reached US$1.12 billion with Vietnam's exports to Germany topping $717 million, 30 per cent higher than last year.

The major items included footwear ($246 million), textile and garment ($157 million), coffee ($83 million), wooden furniture ($31 million), and bicycles and bicycle parts ($30 million).

Some commodities saw especially strong growth: cashew nut exports grew 230 per cent followed by wooden products, vegetables and fruits, and pepper.

Vietnam's imports from Germany posted a 10 per cent growth over the same period last year.

Leading the list of items was machinery and equipment which, at $215 million, accounted for more than half the imports from Germany. The figure also represented an 18 per cent increase over last year.

Other major import items were fabric, chemical products, drugs, raw materials for garments and leather, electronic and computer components and others.

The ministry hoped trade between the two countries would continue to grow. It added that German businesses had so far invested over $250 million in Vietnam, mainly in infrastructure, telecom, technologies and others.

The ministry said a German business delegation would arrive in Vietnam next month to seek trade and investment opportunities. (VNA)

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This pretty much sum up everything on how stable our trading industries is.Woohoo.

What else is Vietnam capable of being in the next....i say "20 years?"

We are expecting a lot more trade with EU's 25 countries in the coming years...

Yeah, that's going to be booming! There are a lot of changes every year... Vietnam is becoming better and better, and living conditions are up... that will also spread to the countryside. More roads, better infrastructure, more equipments, more schools for the children... broadband internet access everywhere... things are going at a very fast pace.

But don't you think our current communist regime is going to spoiled the whole concept of Vietnam progress?

There has been more transparencies since the last two years. Time must change. The VCP is there because of historical reasons, but it will tend to be more like CPs in Western Europe, normalised, weakened or dissolved. That will take some more time probably, but it has already changed politically with peace time. Lots of criticisms from inside the political class. Vietnam's opening to the world will bring yet more changes gradually. Democracy comes with practice and with changes in the Vietnamese society itself.

Broadband internet also helps opening very rapidly the Vietnamese society to the world, and they have excellent broadband 2 to 4 MB/sec since July 2003, now spreading everywhere in all internet cafés throughout the country.

All PCs in webcafés are equiped with webcam. Teenagers use them for chat, power gaming, free international phone calls (more than I can see European teens really using these equipments, because in Vietnam it's very cheap: 4000 VND/hour, that's only US$ 0.25/hour).

Time changes, so politics change also.