Hanoi (VNS/VNA) - Vietnam has seen sharp growth in the number of businessesrun by women, the Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry has said. 

As of September 2019, 24 percent of businesses in the country were owned bywomen, the highest percentage in Southeast Asia.

Phung Minh Thuy, deputy business director and co-founder of HMGpopsaid: “With their, detail-oriented work culture and ability to understandthe market, women have an advantage when it comes to working in a competitiveindustry.”

Yet they face challenges like gender stereotyping and society’s expectation ofbalancing work and family, she said. 

“Entrepreneurship has never been easy, especially for women.” 

Businesswomen have therefore kept seeking new methods to overcome thesechallenges, and e-commerce, including across borders, has come as a boon forthem.

Thuy said she and her husband started with an architecture firmand gained lessons through failures. 
In2012, when the property market suffered a downfall, she decided to investin designing and making 3D pop-up cards and promoting them on e-commercewebsites.

Realising their growth potential since many cultures have a gifting custom, shedecided to choose Amazon to introduce her products to global customers.

“To get Amazon to accept HMGpop, I spent some time to become familiar with howto manage a business on Amazon, such as how to optimise product listings,” shesaid.

Now her products get overwhelming support from customers around the world, andare in top position in the card category with up to 1,300 orders per day.

In 2019-20, her business saw 100 percent growth on Amazon, and revenuesfrom the marketplace now account for 30 percent of the company’s total sales.

Tanisa, a Tay Ninh province speciality and rice product manufacturerand exporter, is another example. 

Tran Hanh Thu, its CEO, said Vietnamese food, with its unique taste and healthbenefits, has always been popular world-wide but did not manage to make a markunlike Japan’s sushi or Korea’s kimchi. Besides, Vietnamese products are oftensold as coming from other Asian countries. 

This was a key motivation for Thu to aspire to sell made-in-Vietnam products toglobal customers and decided to take the Amazon route.

“Though B2B export can help increase revenues, it does not ensure that SMEslike Tanisa can achieve their branding goals. Meanwhile, Amazon has not onlyenabled us to promote Tanisa’s products as 100 percent ‘made-in-Vietnam’ buthas also created a ‘flat world’ in which Tanisa’s products can reachinternational customers directly from the manufacturers in Vietnam. So far, myexperience has been very pleasant.” 

HMGpop and Tanisa are only two of a large number of successful women-ownedenterprises. 

Last December, Amazon launched Vietnamese language support to help sellersstart a digital business and maintain their competitiveness by sharingresources in the local language.

Thuysaid: “Equal opportunity in business is like having the same starting point. Tosucceed and become a leader, you should choose products with competitiveadvantages.”/.