(Anova) - Foreign-made electronics products are heading for Vietnam as the country will officially open its retail market in two months.

Home appliance and electronics products are believed will touch down in Vietnam as soon as Vietnam opens its market, which also means that Vietnamese consumers will have opportunities to buy products at low prices, while domestic electronics producers will have to compete fiercely with the imports.

Imports flocking...

Supermarts and home appliance centres in HCM City say that some importers have offered them new products sourced from Europe and the US the last few weeks.

Local home appliance importers have been importing 20-30% more than usual. Tran Huu Tai, the director of a company specialising in electronics imports, said that most of the imports come from regional countries like Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia which have low import prices and bear low import tax rates.

Lien An Thach, Business and Marketing Director of Cho Lon Home Appliance Supermart, said that the prices of home appliances and electronics products have decreased by 10-30% since the beginning of the year, as distributors have been trying to clear products before the imports flock to Vietnam.

... making local producers worried

In anticipation of the competition threatening, local electronics companies have shifted from making TVs and DVD players to home appliances and consumer electric products. Some others have set up subsidiary companies which specialise in importing products for local distribution. The companies think that with the current tax rates, it would be more profitable to import finished products with the tax rate of 5% than import accessories for domestic assembly with the rate of 3-4%.

Even foreign-invested electronics enterprises are also having to redo their production plans for the time to come. Vu Hoang Chuong, Deputy General Director of JVC Vietnam, said that JVC Vietnam will extend its operation duration in Vietnam for two more years, until December 2010. Chuong said that JVC will maintain normal operation, but it will have to make suitable adjustments to get adapted to the new circumstances.

Deputy General Director of Samsung Vietnam Nguyen Van Dao also said that the company has injected $36mil in a production workshop in Vietnam which will operate until 2015. However, the company will also import products which Samsung does not produce in Vietnam, in order to optimise profit.

(Source: NLD)

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