Hanoi (VNA) - A circular on"Made in Vietnam" products was expected to help businesses avoidaccusations of fraud, said Deputy Minister of Industry and Trade Tran Quoc Khanh at a conference heldin Hanoi on September 25.

Theevent was organised tohear opinions from enterprises and associations on the draft circular, whichdescribes how to identify Vietnamese goods and products.

Manyproducts and goods whose accessories are imported from foreign countries andassembled and processed in Vietnam are sometimes labelled "Made inVietnam", which has sparked public concern.

Khanh said the Ministry ofIndustry and Trade (MoIT) in August had completed a draft circular on how toidentify Vietnamese-made goods.

MoIThas published the draft publicly and will organise two seminars in Hanoi andHCM City to collect comments from the public, businesses and relevantministries before finalising the report and sending it to the Prime Minister.It will then be reviewed again before it is officially issued.

“Thiscircular will not incur costs for enterprises, but help enterprises to moreaccurately label their products to avoid the risk of alleged fraud of origin,and gradually eliminate the situation of imported goods being disguised asVietnamese goods," Khanhnoted.

Sharingthe urgency of the Circular, TranThanh Hai, Deputy Director of MoIT'sImport-Export Department, said the quality of many Vietnamese products andgoods had risen significantly, creating consumer confidence.

However,this situation has also led to more goods being "disguised" asVietnamese goods, causing bad competition and pressure on domestic producers.

"Thiscircular not only concerns the labelling of 'made in Vietnam' goods, but moreimportantly, defines what a Vietnamese product is," Hai said.

Hesaid the circular's most important principle was to lessen the need foradministrative procedures for businesses.

Thedraft will be the basis for creating fair competition for businesses that arediligent in their research, creativity and branding.

Regardinglabelling, TranThi Thu Huong, Director of the Centrefor Commercial Document Certification under the Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry (VCCI), pointed out there wasalready a decree issued by the Government on labels that clearly defined thescope to regulate the matter.

Therefore,it was necessary to consider whether or not this draft circular should beissued or to focus on expanding the existing circular for goods in Vietnam, Huong suggested./.