Hanoi (VNA) – Vietnam’s turnover fromtextiles and garment exports to Australia is forecast to reach a double-digit growth after the signing of the Comprehensive andProgressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) agreement, heard aworkshop in Hanoi on May 9.

Jointly held by the Vietnam Textile and Apparel Association (VITAS) and theIEC Group of Australia, the event focused on measures to help Vietnamese textilesand garment enterprises increase exports to Australia.

According to Nguyen Phuc Nam, Deputy Director ofthe Department of Asia-Pacific Market underthe Ministry ofIndustry and Trade, Australia is a potential market for Vietnamese textiles and garment exporters,while the market share of Vietnamese products in this market remains small.

Truong Van Cam, Vice Chairman and Secretary General of VITAS, said that the currentgrowth of textiles and garment exports to Australia is just below 10 percent,but with the signing of the CPTPP, the rate is expected to reach a double-digitgrowth.

Reports delivered at the workshop showed that total textiles and garment importturnover of the CPTPP member countries exceeded 53 billion USD in 2017, ofwhich Australia was the third biggest import market with total turnoverreaching over 6.2 billion USD, accounting for 11.67 percent.

Vietnam earned over 4.8 billion USD from exporting textiles and garments to theother CPTPP member nations in 2017, making up 9.07 percent of the market share.

As committed inthe CPTPP, Australia will reduce its import duties to 5 percent in the first threeyears after the agreement comes into effect, and to zero percent from the fourthyear for almost products.

Moreover, Australia is gradually shifting to import and outsource textiles andgarment products in Vietnam because of cheaper labour cost and lower tax ratesthan those in China.

Cam said Australia’s textiles and garment import turnover grows by 3-5 percent annuallyin the past 5 years. In 2017, the country imported about 9.32 billion USD oftextiles and garment products from countries in the world. Vietnam’s textilesand garment exports to the nation reached only 173 million USD, equivalent to just1.9 percent of its total textile import turnover.

Vietnam is facinga severe competition from China as the country’s textiles and garment market sharein Australia amounts to 60 percent.

According to TranVan Quyen, a representative of Woolmark Company of Australia in Vietnam, thepurchasing power of Australian consumers is even higher than that in the  US and Europe. However, orders from Australiaare usually small because Australian firms are operating in the form of online business,so they usually order in small quantities, avoiding large inventory.

Vietnamese bigenterprises are not interested in small orders, while small firms of Vietnam donot have a social responsibility certificate to qualify for exporting productsto Australia.

In order to get better access to the market, Vietnamese businesses should enhancepromotion and study more to understand its characteristics, said Nam of the Department of Asia-Pacific Market.-VNA