Packing eggs for export at the DTK Phu Tho Co., Ltd. Last year, Vietnam exported over 34 million eggs, an increase of more than 3.1 times compared to 2022. (Source: VNA)

Last year, livestock products accounted for only 1% of the agricultural, forestry and aquatic product export value to China, at 12.2 billion USD. That was mainly due to Vietnam not yet being permitted official exports of meat products to China.

Deputy Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development Tran Thanh Nam said that with a market of 1.4 billion people, China's consumer demand for meat products is up to about 400 billion USD per year, so the potential for exporting meat from Vietnam to China is many times higher than that of vegetables and fruits.

In the future, Vietnam expects livestock products to join the list of products gaining billion-dollar export value, if Vietnam can sign the protocol on poultry meat export with China, and continue to negotiate the protocol on pork export to this market, Nam said.

For many years, most of Vietnam's livestock products, including pork, beef, and chicken and buffalo meat, have been under unofficial quotas at border gates. This export has faced border barriers, and inspection and control according to stricter standards.

At present, Vietnam ships two products of the livestock industry to China, including bird's nests and milk, under official export according to the protocol on exporting bird's nest signed in 2022 and the protocol on exporting milk signed in 2019 between the two countries.

Thanks to the protocol, Vietnam's exports of milk and milk products to China have grown very rapidly recent years. Those products have accounted for 93% of the total export value of Vietnam's livestock products to China.

Tong Xuan Chinh, Deputy Director of the Department of Livestock Production, said that in 2023, export value of livestock products surged by 26.2% year on year to 515 million USD.

Meanwhile, the import value of livestock products reached 3.53 billion USD, down 4.4% compared to 2022.

The export value of livestock products was only one-seventh of the import value of livestock products, and was also too low compared to other agricultural products, said Chinh.

Last year, Vietnam exported more than 34 million eggs, an increase of more than 3.1 times compared to 2022. In May 2023, Vietnam exported the first batches of eggs to the Republic of Korea.

On July 31, 2023, after four years of ban, Vietnam's poultry eggs came back to Hong Kong. This market immediately accounted for about 70% of eggs exported from Vietnam.

On November 2, 2023, Vietnam and Mongolia officially completed negotiations to export poultry meat and eggs to the Mongolian market.

According to the Department of Livestock Production, in 2023, Vietnam exported 12,300 tonnes of pork, earning nearly 63.3 million USD, an increase of 28% compared to 2022. Fresh, chilled or frozen pork products of Vietnam were shipped to Papua New Guinea, Laos and Malaysia.

Vietnam's fresh milk exports in 2023 also grew by 1.7 times compared to 2022 to reach 204 million USD. Especially, fresh milk exports to China skyrocketed from 48 million USD in 2022 to 123 million USD in 2023.

Meanwhile, Vietnam has seven enterprises exporting 700kg of bird’s nests in total to China, after Vietnam gained permission for official export of bird’s nests to this market last year.