Speaking at the Conference, Mr. Nguyen Manh Tien - Deputy Chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee said that Vietnam is one of the countries with an open economy, having signed and joined many international treaties in the field of economics and trade, especially being a member of 16 free trade agreements (FTAs).
Signing and joining international treaties and participating in FTAs have made important contributions to expanding and deepening our country's relations with partners, creating intertwined interests, and contributing to maintaining a peaceful and stable environment for national development.
Effective implementation of FTAs, especially new-generation FTAs, has created opportunities to expand and diversify markets with high incentives, participate more deeply in the global supply chain and production network; actively contribute to the process of synchronous and comprehensive innovation, unleash the country's potential and the creativity of all classes of people, improve people's lives, raise the level of development, and gradually reduce the proportion of processing and assembly in the economy.
In addition to the advantages, the implementation of new international commitments also poses many difficulties and challenges for domestic enterprises. Many advantageous products of Vietnam have a C/O usage rate of 92%-100% in FTAs such as: corn, wheat, paper of all kinds, fertilizers, trucks, some iron and steel products, footwear products, textiles... but the export value is not high.
Meanwhile, every year, Vietnam has to face many anti-dumping and anti-subsidy lawsuits. On the other hand, there is a risk that goods and products from third countries will be “disguised” as goods of Vietnamese origin to enjoy preferential treatment under the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) and FTAs in general, or to evade trade defense taxes of Vietnam’s partner countries.
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Overview of the Symposium on international treaties and free trade agreements in the Central Highlands region. |
Currently, the world context is witnessing many conflicts, trade tensions between major economies continue to develop complicatedly. To avoid multi-dimensional impacts on domestic economic development and international trade cooperation, Vietnam needs to quickly adapt to the current adjustment trend and trade tensions, protect the domestic economy, and at the same time implement flexible and effective trade policies, promoting the implementation of extensive commitments in FTAs.
The National Assembly also promulgated the Law on International Treaties in 2016, creating a legal basis for the signing and implementation of international treaties in the new period, especially in the context of Vietnam joining new generation FTAs. The work of supervising the implementation of international treaties also plays an important role, which is of interest to the National Assembly Standing Committee and National Assembly agencies to ensure that Vietnam's international commitments are complied with and implemented in practice.
According to Mr. Nguyen Manh Tien, the world is changing very quickly and a lot, now the multipolar world has clearly formed. Previously, there were many agreements with Western countries, standards and criteria following Western countries. Now another pole has been formed, with different criteria and standards. So how do we conduct “bamboo diplomacy” in this economic field? How do we conduct ourselves to ensure the highest national interests?
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Mr. Nguyen Manh Tien - Deputy Chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee spoke at the Conference. |
This conference aims to review the results of implementing international treaties and FTAs in the Central Highlands region. It encourages the promotion of positive results achieved; discusses solutions to adjust and overcome existing problems, especially discussing the issue of localization and disseminating information to businesses.
At the Conference, delegates focused on assessing the organization and implementation of international treaties and FTAs; the practical benefits brought by FTAs to Vietnam in the fields of investment, trade, labor, and institutional improvement; the coordination in organizing the implementation of international treaties by the Government, relevant ministries, branches, and localities, and the roles and responsibilities of relevant agencies in supervising the implementation of international treaties; assessing the implementation results and disseminating information about free trade agreements; obstacles, difficulties, causes, and solutions...
According to Ms. Pham Quynh Mai - Deputy Director of the Multilateral Trade Policy Department (Ministry of Industry and Trade), over the past 8 years, since Vietnam joined and implemented FTAs, Vietnam's exports have penetrated deeply into the markets of partner countries and Vietnam's trade balance has maintained a trade surplus.
Notably, when signing and implementing 3 new generation FTAs, namely EVFTA, CPTPP, UKVFTA, Vietnam's export turnover has grown extremely strongly. Especially with CPTPP, it has opened the door for Vietnamese goods to enter completely new markets such as Canada, Mexico, Peru. Growth to Vietnam's FTA markets in recent years has maintained double digits, and export turnover to new markets with FTAs is also very impressive.
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Ms. Pham Quynh Mai - Deputy Director of Multilateral Trade Policy Department (Ministry of Industry and Trade) spoke at the Conference. |
Ms. Pham Quynh Mai added that, besides impressive results, the implementation of FTAs still has shortcomings and limitations. Typically, the proportion of new generation FTAs in total exports is still modest, FDI enterprises still account for a large proportion, Vietnam's exports are mainly raw, and have not built many brands in the FTA market.
In addition, the dissemination of information and policies to support businesses is not complete, in some places it is not good, the dissemination content is general, not focusing on the content that businesses are interested in; business support activities are still general and scattered, the program to connect businesses and credit institutions has not been effective; the work of perfecting institutions, policies, and internalizing commitments is not proactive, sometimes slow.
In addition, the number of officials in charge of implementing FTAs is still lacking and the quality is weak; the number of specialized FTA human resources of enterprises is still limited; the issue of sustainable development has not received due attention, and the utilization of FTAs in localities is still low.
In the coming time, the Ministry of Industry and Trade will focus on the group of solutions for propaganda and monitoring the implementation of FTAs. In the group of propaganda solutions, the Ministry of Industry and Trade will innovate the method of disseminating information through the creation of propaganda videos, supporting the implementation of FTA commitments. In monitoring the implementation of FTAs, the Ministry of Industry and Trade will develop a set of indicators for monitoring the implementation of FTAs (FTA Index). In addition, it will continue to implement groups of solutions on institutions, business support, human resources and other solutions.
Source: https://baophapluat.vn/bo-cong-thuong-se-tap-trung-tuyen-truyen-va-giam-sat-thuc-thi-cac-fta-post527172.html
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