Vietnam may fail to reach export target for 2007

Vietnam is likely to fail to attain its export target of nearly 48.8 billion U.S. dollars this year, partly due to falling short of goods, local newspaper Youth reported Wednesday. The country may face difficulty in shipping broad rice, one of key export items, this year because of thin supplies, the newspaper quoted the Vietnamese Trade Ministry as reporting.

Vietnam exported 710,000 tons of rice worth 229 million dollars in the first quarter of this year, posting respective year-on-year declines of 43.3 percent and 33.2 percent, and reaching 15.7 percent and 17 percent of the annualized targets set for export volume and value, respectively.

For some categories of textiles and garments, local enterprises are facing a supervision program conducted by the United States, which might result in anti-dumping suits. Vietnam, which posted export turnovers of 39.6 billion dollars in 2006, up 22.1 percent against 2005, reaped export revenues of nearly 10.5 billion dollars in the first quarter of this year, a year-on-year surge of 17.9 percent.