The drop was the result of the sharp fall in export value of major farming products, which plummeting 11.7 per cent to $9 billion against the same period last year.— Photo ndhmone

HA NOI (Biz Hub)— The export value of the farming, forestry and fisheries sector saw a slight year-on-year decline of 1.1 per cent in the first eight months of the year.

The Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development reported that the value had fallen to US$17.98 billion.

The drop was the result of the sharp fall in export value of major farming products, which plummeting 11.7 per cent to $9 billion against the same period last year.

Contrastingly, fisheries and forestry products saw a year-on-year increase of 1.3 per cent and 11.7 per cent to $4 billion and $3.52 billion respectively.

Nguyen Viet Chien, Director of the ministrys Information and Statistics Centre, said the failure of farming products had been particularly damaging and was caused by market difficulties and a reduction in export prices.

In addition, the economic crisis in export markets also stopped Vietnamese farming and fisheries products from reaching their full potential, he added.

Chien argued that Vietnamese commodities did not consistently meet the standards in quality, safety and hygiene expected by export markets.

In order to see an export value recovery, he called for farmers and local export processors to apply technologies for more effective production, improve quality of their products and better organise supply chains.

According to ministry statistics, rice faced the largest reduction in exports due to a decline in export price of 3.2 per cent, down to $438.5 per tonne against the same period last year.

Rice experienced a year-on-year drop of 15.7 per cent in volume to 4.69 million tonnes and lost 18.4 per cent in value, falling to $2.05 billion.

China was the largest export market of Vietnamese rice, with a total export volume of 1.47 million tonnes, earning $609 million, accounting for 32.8 per cent of total rice exports.

Rubber also saw a strong fall in export value as prices were cut by 18 per cent to $2,387 per tonne, leading to a year-on-year drop of 14.1 per cent to $1.52 billion. Meanwhile, rubber export volume gained a year-on-year increase of 4.6 per cent to reach 638,000 tonnes.

During the first eight months, cassava exports had a strong decline of 29.6 per cent in volume to hit 2.27 million tonnes and 24.1 per cent in value to chalk $742 million.

However, cashew and wood products gained increase in both export volume and value for the first eight months.

The exports of those commodities achieved a year-on-year surge of 18.9 per cent in volume and 10.8 per cent in value for cashew and of 11.6 per cent in value for wood products. — VNS