Advantages from FTAs
Two years of prolonged epidemic and complicated developments have strongly affected the production and consumption of products by industries and consumers around the world. However, for cashew nut processing and export, world consumer consumption has not slowed down because of the epidemic. On the contrary, experts in the cashew processing industry see that the demand for this product has many advantages to increase in the coming time. Therefore, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development has set an export growth target for the cashew industry in 2022 at US$3.8 billion.
According to the Vietnam Cashew Association, Vietnam can take advantage of the EU-Vietnam Free Trade Agreement (EVFTA) and the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP). Because the tax rate for products processed from cashew kernels imported into Europe from Vietnam has been reduced to 0% immediately after the EVFTA took effect from August 1, 2020, before it was from 7 to 12%. . Therefore, there is still a lot of room for the growth of cashew nut exports in the European market for this year and the coming years.
Besides Europe, cashew nut exports to China also have a lot of growth prospects. Vietnam’s cashew nut market share in the total value of China’s imports will account for about 89% in 2021. Notably, in the past few years, nuts have become a major ingredient in the Chinese diet. Chinese people.
Even to implement the national health policy, China also released a “Dietary Guidelines for the Chinese People”. This guide emphasizes the daily consumption of nuts.
Need to meet raw materials for processing
However, in order to meet the orders of customers from Europe, the US, China, and Africa, cashew nut processing and exporting enterprises need to first prepare a source of raw materials for processing. variable. Domestic production of cashew nuts currently only meets less than one third of the processing capacity of factories. Therefore, the import of raw cashew nuts from cashew producing countries is inevitable.
According to Mr. Dang Hoang Giang, General Secretary of the Vietnam Cashew Association, the cashew export target of US$3.8 billion set by the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development for Vietnam’s cashew industry in 2022 is the basis and motivation. force for enterprises to boost production, processing and export. This is both a driving force and a pressure because raw materials for processing always have to import more than two thirds of output for export.
Currently, the whole country has just over 300,000 hectares of cashew nut production, with an output of approximately 340,000 tons. Meanwhile, the output for processing is approximately 1.6 million tons. Therefore, cashew processing and exporting enterprises import raw materials from African countries and Cambodia. Currently, Vietnam’s raw cashew imports are gradually shifting to Cambodia to have more advantages in transportation, including quality, processing and export.
Mr. Dang Hoang Giang added that, in the localities producing raw cashew nuts, Binh Phuoc province has the largest output for the cashew industry, with uniform quality. Therefore, in order to produce, process and export cashew sustainably, especially to realize the export target of USD 3.8 billion in 2022, the cashew capital of Binh Phuoc has a plan to promote cooperation models. efficient and sustainable so that at least 50% of cashew acreage is produced according to a certified process.
In addition, each district with a cashew-growing area must build at least one value chain linkage model, although Binh Phuoc province has built 10 cashew production areas with a minimum scale of 300 ha/region, 4 areas specialized in large-scale farming and 4 high-tech agricultural areas for the production of raw cashew nuts for export.
According to Mr. Ta Quang Huyen, Vice Chairman of the Vietnam Cashew Association, the Covid-19 epidemic cannot hinder the export cashew industry, because world consumers still have a great demand for this item.
Typically, during the country’s response to the Covid-19 epidemic, cashew processing and exporting factories were still operating normally. The difficulty is supplying raw materials for processing in a timely manner, retaining employees so that they can produce orders on time under the contract. In a year of epidemic response, but the cashew industry has also overcome difficulties, the export target in 2022 will also be completed when the whole industry makes efforts to implement…
