The EU - Vietnam Free Trade Agreement (EVFTA) has opened up unprecedentedly big opportunities for Vietnamese rice export. Thanks to preferential tariffs, the shipments of fragrant and high-quality rice to the EU have reaped encouraging results.

The Ministry of Industry and Trade said though rice export to the EU is not big in volume compared to other regional markets, it posts high added value since the 27 EU members consume mainly fragrant and high-quality grain from Vietnam. Domestic firms have made full use of the rice quota entitled to an import duty of 0% to boost shipments to the bloc, reported the Cong Thuong (Industry & Trade) newspaper.

In 2022, the country saw a sharp increase in rice export to the EU to 94,510 tonnes, surpassing the annual quota of 80,000 tonnes granted to Vietnam under the EVFTA. Prices of the produce sold to the EU stood at 688 USD per tonne, 41.4% higher than the general export price of 486 USD per tonne of Vietnamese rice, statistics show.

This indicates the quality of Vietnamese rice has been improved and satisfied strict requirements from demanding markets, and that enterprises have been making good use of the EVFTA.

In the first four months of 2023, Vietnam shipped nearly 2.9 million tonnes of rice worth almost 1.53 billion USD abroad, up 40.7% in volume and 51.6% in value from a year earlier. Export prices averaged 527 USD per tonne, rising 7.8%. Notably, exports to some EU markets surged such as the Netherlands 44%, Poland 68%, Spain 89%, and Belgium 149%.

With stable demand, especially for fragrant and high-quality rice, the EU is expected to remain a highly potential market for Vietnamese exporters, according to Cong Thuong.

Under the EVFTA, the EU granted Vietnam an annual export quota of 80,000 tonnes of rice, including 30,000 tonnes of milled, 20,000 tonnes of unmilled, and 30,000 tonnes of fragrant one. In particular, it will completely liberalise the export of broken rice, which will help Vietnam ship about 100,000 tonnes of this type of grain to this block each year. Meanwhile, import duties on products made from rice will be slashed to 0% after three - five years./.