Efforts made to "clear the way" for import and export

Difficulties in the market, declining demand for goods, export orders of many key industries of the province have clearly decreased, which was shown by export results in the first quarter of 2023. Provincial leaders directed branches, levels, investors, and enterprises in the province to make efforts to solve difficulties, continue to support production and business, stimulate import and export activities, take advantage of time to speed up the process of socio-economic recovery and development of the province.

To promote import and export activities of enterprises in the province, Binh Duong Customs Department is implementing practical and convenient solutions. In photo:  Customs officers carry out professional works at Binh Duong General Port.

Trade surplus but still have difficulties

With industry as the main economic sector and export accounting for a large proportion, Binh Duong province's economic openness is quite high (174%), hence it is easily affected by fluctuations from the global market. In which, export orders from main markets account for 80% of the province's export value, namely, the US (33%), EU (12%), Japan (10.6%), Republic of Korea (RoK) (9.4%), Taiwan (7.7%), Hong Kong (7.3%), decreased strongly.  Import-export of Binh Duong in the first quarter of 2023 faced many difficulties, main export products, main export markets of the province continued to shrink its demand, due to effects of inflation, the conflict between Russia and Ukraine, low consumer demand...

However, according to Provincial Statistics Office, the export turnover of goods in March of 2023, despite a decrease compared to the same period last year, increased compared to two months ago. FDI enterprises continue to lead the province's export growth. Specifically, in March, exports were estimated at over $3,122 million, up 36.4% MoM and down 7.7% YoY. In which, the domestic economic sector reached 587.3 million USD, up 36.8% and down 8.9% YoY; FDI sector reached 2,535.1 million USD, up 36.3%. The balance of trade of Binh Duong province over the first 3 months of 2023 was in favor of a trade surplus with 2,174.4 million USD. In which, the domestic-invested economic sector gained a trade surplus of $627.7 million, the foreign-invested economic sector had a trade surplus of $1,546.7 million.

Currently, enterprises in most product lines are aware that export and import activities in the second quarter will still face many difficulties. Regarding the number of new export orders, 28% of enterprises were forecasted that their number of export orders would increase compared to the first quarter of 2023; 38.3% of enterprises said that the number of production orders was stable as in the first quarter of 2023 and 33.1% of enterprises assessed that the number of orders for export in the second quarter of 2023 would continue to decrease compared to Q1-2023.

Pham Trong Nhan, Director of provincial Department of Planning and Investment, said that in order to recover and stimulate the province's economic growth in the second quarter and the whole year of 2023, the province is actively implementing many solutions to support businesses. The province has directed branches and levels together with investors and businesses in the province to remove difficulties, continue to support production and business, facilitate import-export activities, and take advantage of time to speed up the recovery process and socio-economic development of the province.

Put more effort to provide support

In order to support and create favorable conditions for enterprises, Binh Duong General Port Customs Branch has promoted the application of information technology and modern equipment to clear goods in the fastest way.  In particular, the processing and delivery of goods at Binh Duong port will help businesses save 400,000 - 500,000 VND in transportation costs for each container. And if adding the port fee charged by Ho Chi Minh City, the savings for each container is up to 1 million VND.

Director of Binh Duong General Port Customs Branch Huynh Anh Tuan said that the branch regularly organizes meetings with businesses to exchange and solve problems as well as capture information on production activities and import-export plans of enterprises to have appropriate support solutions for the recovery and development of production and business of enterprises.

Nguyen Truc Huong, Head of Import-Export Department of De Licacy Vietnam Industry Co., Ltd., said that as a 100% Taiwanese-invested enterprise specializing in yarn production, currently every month this company make about 300 customs declarations for import and export goods. In order to smoothly finish this very large number of declarations, the company always receives support in the process of customs clearance in Binh Duong.

In order to promote import-export activities of enterprises in the province, Binh Duong Customs Department is implementing solutions to support enterprises through accelerating administrative reform, modernization, and creating maximum convenience for enterprises to shorten the time and cost when doing customs clearance procedures. Nguyen Thanh Binh, Deputy Director of Binh Duong Customs Department, said that the area has mainly processing and manufacturing enterprises for export, in order to create favorable conditions for these enterprises, recently, Binh Duong Customs Department Duong has gradually implemented the digital transformation. Up to now, the digital transformation, administrative procedure reform and modernization of customs offices in the province have gradually come into order, aimed to build a professional and service-oriented and efficient administration; creating an open environment for investment, production and business activities; thereby contributing to improving the confidence of enterprises in tax policy, law and tax management.

Sharing with the difficulties of exporting enterprises, Nguyen Thanh Ha, Deputy Director of Provincial Department of Industry and Trade, said that the department is assisting businesses in promoting e-commerce, accessing information channels about exports to find new markets; supporting wood processing enterprises to find domestic sources of wood materials. In addition, Department of Industry and Trade regularly organizes meetings with business associations in the province to understand situation of enterprises and promptly assist them in solving difficulties.

Reported by Ngoc Thanh - Translated by Ngoc Huynh