HCM City (VNA) - The Middle East market still has a large room forVietnamese businesses to boost exports, experts said at the seminar on "Goldenopportunity for Vietnamese exports to Middle Eastern countries after the COVID-19pandemic" on March 17.

Nguyen Tuan, Deputy Director of the Investment and TradePromotion Centre of Ho Chi Minh City (ITPC), said that the region, encompassing16 countries with a total population of about 400 million and high living standards, isemerging as a potential market for Vietnamese businesses. However,Vietnam's trade relations with the region mainly focus on the countries of theGulf Cooperation Council (GCC) which consists of the United Arab Emirates (UAE),Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar and Oman with a combined population of 65million in 2021.

According to Tuan, the Middle East has a very large importdemand for furniture, plastic products, cereals, textiles, footwear, rubber andrubber products, meat, milk and dairy products, and vegetables, with the valueof each commodity estimated at 2-8 billion USD.

These are all advantageous products of Vietnam, he stressed,adding that the proportion of these products of Vietnam in the import structureof Middle Eastern countries is still low.

Statistics show that these countries import about 80 percentof food and food stuffs, equivalent to about 40 billion USD a year. By 2035,the figure is expected to increase to 70 billion USD a year.

Another advantage when exporting to the Middle East is theimport tax rates of only 0-5 percent,he added.

Vietnamese Ambassador to Kuwait Ngo Toan Thang said that inrecent years, Vietnam's import and export turnover to GCC countries has increasedrapidly, especially from 2012. The country's trade turnover to these nations raisedfrom 2.7 billion USD in 2012 to 12.5 billion USD in 2021.

He further said opportunities forVietnamese businesses in this market are wide open with many advantages, as Vietnamhas long-term diplomatic and cooperative relations with the GCC countries.

Experts said that current problems of Vietnamese enterprisesin general and Ho Chi Minh City in particular when accessing the Middle Eastmarket are a lack of information, barriers to logistics and internationalpayments. Therefore, it is necessary to promote market survey and tradeconnectivity activities, and meet with modern distribution channel systems inthe Middle East, especially Vietnam’s two strong export markets of the UAE andKuwait./.