Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh hosted a reception in Hanoi on April 8 for Sergey Ivanovich Kudryashov, General Director of Russia’s Zarubezhneft JSC, who is on a working visit to Vietnam to seek cooperation opportunities in oil and gas and energy.

Minister of Industry and Trade Nguyen Hong Dien and Lao Minister of Industry and Commerce Malaithong Kommasith signed a new Vietnam-Laos trade agreement following their talks in Vientiane, Laos on April 8.

The steel market is "hot" with two conflicting opinions on the issue of initiating an anti-dumping investigation on hot-rolled coil (HRC) steel products imported from China to Vietnam. But clearly, all decisions need to be based on specific and objective data to create a healthy competitive environment.

Chinese Commerce Minister Wang Wentao said on Monday in France that China's anti-dumping investigation into brandy imported from the EU does not target any specific EU countries nor carry predefined findings, as China and the EU have strengthened communication recently to clear the clouds hanging over bilateral economic and trade cooperation.

Imagine there was a food tax that increased your grocery bills by nearly 20%. That’s essentially what the Common Agricultural Policy does to food prices in the EU. Now picture that tax going up even more, to 50%. That’s exactly what the EU’s recent decision to slap hefty tariffs on Russian grain imports is all about.

The current negotiations for an ambitious, mutually beneficial new trade deal with Indonesia, similar to the ones already successfully concluded and implemented with Singapore and Vietnam, should be agreed before the end of President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo’s term.

Canada is currently the 7th largest and most important export market of Vietnam. Many industries such as rice, textiles, spices and processed foods... still have great potential to penetrate the market. However, issues such as logistics costs, increasing competition, and the lack of a strong brand mark for Vietnamese products are problems that enterprises need to overcome to increase exports to Canada.

Promoting export is critical in a world of rapid international integration, but to gain strength in export, it is important for enterprises to have strong foothold in the domestic market.

Vietnam’s squid and octopus exports in the first quarter of the year are estimated at about US$136 million, suffering a slight decrease of 2% against the same period from last year, according to the Vietnam Association of Seafood Exporters and Producers (VASEP).

Over the past two months of this year, the country spent US$18.69 million on importing over 8,400 tonnes of chilled or frozen pork, marking a yearly decline of 1 per cent in value but 4.2 per cent rise in volume, according to the General Department of Việt Nam Customs.