Two-way trade between Vietnam and Russia might not reach US$10 billion next year as expected, Russian officials said, citing a lull in trade.

The Russian Consul General in HCMC (L) and Russia’s commercial counselor are seen
at a press briefing on Vietnam-Russia ties in 2019, held today, December 16, in HCMC
- Photo: Hung Le 

Dmitry Makarov, head of the HCMC office of the Trade Representation of the Russian Federation in Vietnam, released the forecast at a press briefing which the Russian Consulate General in HCMC held on December 16, to review the development of Vietnam-Russia bilateral ties in 2019.

The Vietnam-Russia official trade figure for the whole year is not available, but data from the Russian side showed that the figure recorded in the first nine months of the year totaled around US$3.6 billion. Meanwhile, the volume of trade between the two nations reached US$6.1 billion last year, up 16.4% versus 2017.

According to the Russian representative, this year has seen a sudden fall in Russia-Vietnam trade, particularly for Russian exports to Vietnam.

In January-September, two-way trade dropped 10% against the year-ago period. Of this, Vietnam’s exports to Russia picked up 3% in the period, while Russia’s shipments to Vietnam totaled only US$828 million, which represented just 80% of the year-ago figure.

The Russian official attributed the decline in Russian exports to Vietnam to the Southeast Asian nation’s protectionist measures.

The exports of many groups of Russian products, including iron and steel, wheat and fertilizer, to Vietnam sharply plunged in the nine-month period due to the impact of trade protectionism. These are items that Vietnam imports the most, Dmitry Makarov noted.

Specifically, Russia's export of steel to Vietnam fell from US$222 million to US$66.5 million, as Vietnam has restricted imports of steel sheets, weakening the competitiveness of Russian steel on the local market.

Russian wheat suffered a similar fate. As Vietnam has restricted the import of Russian wheat contaminated with weed seeds, the export revenue of this product to Vietnam has plummeted from US$447 million to US$89 million.

Overall, export revenues from three Russian product lines---steel, wheat and fertilizer---recorded a total dip of US$540 million in the nine-month period, equivalent to 65% of Russia’s total exports to Vietnam.

With these results, he cautioned that the bilateral trade target of US$10 billion in 2020 between Vietnam and Russia would be unachievable and would take a few years to be reached.

However, the representative of the Russian Consulate General in HCMC still had high hopes for the rising volume of trade between Vietnam and Russia in the years to come, buoyed by Vietnam’s free trade agreement with the Russian-led Eurasian Economic Union.