Vinatex urged to improve products to weather the storm

VNBusinessNews – The Viet Nam National Textile and Garment Group (Vinatex) needs to improve the quality and lower the prices of its products in order to fulfill this year’s target of 10-10.5 billion USD in export turnover and ensure continued employment for the industry’s estimated 2 million workers.

Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung made this request during a working session attended by cabinet members, the leaders of Vinatex and the Vietnam Textile and Apparel Association (Vitas) on Feb. 23.

Vinatex needs to complete its financial procedures, speed up the development of its human resources and work closely alongside Vitas to expand its domestic and export markets, the PM noted.

The government plans to provide support to the group by adopting a number of favourable policies regarding exports, labour, finance and taxes, he added.

Whilst acknowledging the difficulties faced by the sector amidst the global economic crisis, the government leader pointed out a number of industry shortcomings, including a failure to make a breakthrough in terms of branding, a low ownership to capital ratio and low rate of localisation.

Le Quoc An, Chairman of both Vinatex and Vitas, reported that the sector raked in 1.15 billion USD from exports in the first two months of 2009, a 12% decrease compared to the same period last year.

An predicted that the demand for garments would drop by 20 percent over the first quarter of this year, and suffer a further 15 percent decline during the next three months due to the impact of the global economic slowdown, particularly in major markets as the US, the European Union and Japan.

To cope with the challenges affecting the export markets and to ensure the stable employment of up to 2 million workers, the industry is adopting a host of urgent measures to boost both domestic sales and exports, as well as formulating new policies regarding finances, social security, staff training and technology. (VNA)