VietNamNet Bridge – Vietnamese and Japanese businesses plan to join forces
with develop priority industries. However, they still cannot map out any
business plans until a government’s action plan is approved.
Nguyen Van Tan, Director of the Hanoi-based Thong Tan Trade and Food Processing
Company, said he got no new information from the workshop on the industry
development strategy held recently by the Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and
Industry (VCCI) and the Japan Economic Fund (JEF).
Tan said on Dau tu that he still has not found the answers to his questions,
especially the one about how the State would support enterprises to develop
associates.
Being a business that makes products for exports, Tan understands that he needs
to cooperate with partners to develop. Thong Tan keeps associates with many
partners, but it still has many problems.
“It’s very difficult to control the quality of the materials supplied. Will the
State get involved in this issue? Is it true that only the enterprises to be
located near each other in the same area will be able to associate?” he
questioned.
Ecolink, one of the few businesses pioneering in developing link chains,
connecting the material growing areas, food processing and distribution, also
said it has got puzzled with overlapping regulations.
Under the law on the quality of goods, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural
Development (MARD) is in charge of managing the initial production process. The
Ministry of Health (MOH) is in charge of managing consumer goods. Meanwhile the
Law on Food Safety commissions three ministries, including MARD, MOH and the
Ministry of Industry and Trade to take the state management over the groups of
products.
Than Di Ngu, Director of Ecolink, said if the relevant ministries and branches
cannot clarify their responsibilities, it would be impossible to implement the
plans on link chain development, while businesses would not be able to exploit
their opportunities.
Both Vietnamese and Japanese feel impatient to know when and how the plans would
be implemented.
Noriyuki Yonemura, JEF’s Secretary General, said Vietnam will have to fulfill
its roadmap of cutting the tariffs in accordance with the ASEAN Free Trade
Agreement by 2018. If Vietnam continues wasting its investments in labor
intensive industries in the context of the steady labor cost increase, foreign
investors would head for other countries. “There is not much time left,” he gave
a warning.
Under the framework of the Vietnam-Japan cooperation program on implementing
Vietnam’s industrialization strategy, food processing is one of the six
industries Vietnam will prioritize to develop. The other five industries include
household electrics/electronics, shipbuilding, agricultural machinery,
environment and energy saving, automobile industry and car part production.
It was initially expected that the strategy compilation would finish in March
2013, while an action plan would be draw up by the third quarter of 2013.
However, sources from the strategy compilation taskforce have said the compilers
are still collecting opinions from relevant ministries and branches.
The 6 chosen industries for priority development are the fields that Vietnam
wants to develop most. However, these are also the business fields that Japanese
enterprises are interested and want to invest in.
There are a lot of Japanese enterprises operating in these fields in Vietnam,
namely Acecook, Kyoei Food in food processing, Panasonic in electronics, Honda
and Toyota in automobile manufacturing.
The Japanese side has expressed its worry about the problems arisen during the
action plan building, including the limited resources and unclear comprehensive
measures for the industrial policy implementation.
TBKTVN