Agricultural exports at standstill Tan Thanh border gate

Hundreds of trucks carrying Vietnamese farm produce exports have been standing in a long queue of several kilometers, waiting to go through the customs agencies to China.

Tuoi tre newspaper on January 19 quoted Tran Van Nghia, Deputy Head of the Tan Thanh Customs Sub-agency in Lang Son province saying that Vietnamese farm exports have been getting stuck at the border gate since January 18.

The newspaper said that as Chinese dealers still have not accepted deliveries, customs clearance has been going slowly. Meanwhile, the number of trucks arriving in the goods-controlling area has exceeded the allowed number. It is estimated that more than 6000 tons of exported goods are in deadlock.

According to the Tan Thanh Customs Sub-agency, on January 18, only 78 trucks completed procedures for customs clearance, while 250 other trucks were still waiting. Nghia said that most of the exports were watermelons. China is restricting imported watermelon at a time when it is the main crop harvested in Quang Ngai and Binh Dinh provinces in Vietnam.

Nguyen Van Hoi, Deputy Director of the Trade Policies for Mountainous and Border Areas under the Ministry of Industry and Trade, said that about 200 trucks arrive a day, but the parking area is just capable of holding 150-160 trucks.

According to Hoi, 70 percent of trucks have cold storage compartments, therefore, their cargo does not suffer severe damage, while the other 30 percent of trucks carrying bananas and water melon have suffered losses.

In fact, the deadlock at border gates with China has been occurring continuously for the last 10 years, and it is always Vietnamese farmers, not Chinese dealers, who suffer from the deadlock. However, to date, no proper solution has been found to settle the problem. Hoi has blamed this on the poor infrastructure of the Tan Thanh area. In 2009, only 36,000 trucks of goods arrived in the border area and the number rose to 42,000 trucks in 2010. Besides, there are also about 51,000 trucks carrying imported goods, thus making the deadlock more serious.

According to Hoi, another reason is that the Chinese side requires Vietnamese exports to be packed in accordance with the standards applied for border markets, but not all Vietnamese businessmen can meet the requirements. As the result, Vietnamese businessmen have to repack their goods again before going through the border, which always takes time. Since farm produce gets stuck for 3-5 days, their quality goes down, therefore, Vietnamese farmers cannot sell at high prices.

“If we can persuade Vietnamese businessmen to pack goods in accordance with the standards, we can let 250 trucks go through every day,” Hoi affirmed.

He went on to say that the Ministry of Industry and Trade is discussing measures to help ease the congestion of goods at the border gate. The most important measure, is to apply an information updating mechanism which allows them to regulate the carrying of exported goods from the production areas to the border areas.

The Prime Minister has approved the program on border-area trade promotion, under which Vietnam will apply a mechanism on assisting businessmen to export fruits to China.

Regarding the infrastructure upgrading, the ministry has anticipated that the demand for exporting farm produce to China will increase sharply, therefore, Vietnam is considering expanding roads to Tan Thanh and enlarging storages. The Lang Son province’s authorities have decided to use 4300 more square meters of land for a goods-controlling area, so that the area capacity will be big enough for 500 trucks per day.

In the latest news, according to Tuoi tre, by January 20 afternoon, 500 trucks had been left at the border gate. – Tuoi tre

Tags: Vietnam Agricultural exports