Outgoing Dutch Prime Minister, Mark Rutte was in Hanoi last week talking up trade and investment between the Netherlands and Vietnam. Here’s what was achieved in his two-day stopover and how trade and investment are shaping up between these two nations.

Thanks to free trade agreements with tariff barriers gradually being removed, the exports of Vietnamese products have been on the rise. However, they are likely to face trade defence lawsuits.

Experts have been exploring various solutions to restore the competitiveness of Vietnamese shrimp exports, as reduced demand and higher requirements in terms of transparency and environment safety have had a significant impact on the sector since early this year.

The export turnover in October is expected to reach 32.3 billion USD, up 5.3 month-on-month, showing a positive signal given the 6.3% decrease recorded in the previous month.

There remains an ample room for cooperation between the European Union (EU) and Vietnam in the fields of pharmaceuticals, food stuff and automobile industry, European Commission (EC) Executive Vice President Valdis Dombrovskis, who is also the EU's Trade Commissioner, has said.

Vietnam and Denmark adopted a joint statement on the establishment of a green strategic partnership between the two countries, during online talks on November 1 between Vietnamese Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh and his Danish counterpart Mette Frederiksen.

Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh called for the European Commission (EC) to remove its “yellow card” against illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing in Vietnam at a reception in Hanoi on November 2 for Valdis Dombrovskis, the visiting executive vice president of the EC.

The Industry and Trade Ministry yesterday held a trade promotion meeting with the Vietnamese trade system abroad, themed ‘Helping the seafood industry to increase export’.

Vietnam is currently a major producer of agricultural products, an achievement greatly attributable to science and technology, according to the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (MARD).

The EU-Vietnam Free Trade Agreement (EVFTA) has helped accelerate the recovery of Vietnam’s exports to the EU, especially in the first two years since it came into effect in 2020, yet the impact is somewhat less positive in the third year, according to a report released by the Central Institute for Economic Management (CIEM) on October 27.