Vietnam Buying $3 Billion in U.S. Farm Goods to Ease Trump Tariff Threats
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Vietnam,
looking to allay the Trump administration’s wrath over its soaring
trade surplus with the U.S., is committing to buy $3 billion in farm
products from Nebraska.
The
agricultural shopping spree is part of a campaign to address complaints
about the trade surplus and difficulties U.S. companies face in
accessing Vietnamese markets.
“We
see a lot of room to increase purchases from America, and that will
significantly help narrow our trade gap with the U.S.,” said Nguyen Do
Anh Tuan, the agriculture ministry’s spokesman, who was part of a recent
Vietnamese delegation to meet farm-product producers in the U.S. “Our
demand for American farming products is very high.”
Vietnamese
companies signed 18 agreements with American producers to buy about $3
billion of farm products in the next two to three years, Tuan, director
general of the agriculture ministry’s international cooperation
department, said in an interview. The deals include purchases of 100,000
cows, 3 million tons of wheat and barley worth as much as $800 million,
and fruit, corn and soy animal feed, according to Tuan.
“We
will have regular meetings with these Vietnamese companies to give them
timely support in implementing the signed MOUs,” Tuan said. “We also
want to buy more high-tech equipment from the U.S. to make more
value-added farm products in the future.”
Wrath of Trump
Vietnam’s
leaders are doing all they can to avoid China’s fate after U.S.
President Donald Trump, asked in June 2019 if he wanted to impose
tariffs on Vietnam, described the Southeast Asian nation as “almost the
single worst abuser of everybody.”
Vietnam’s
exports to the U.S. reached $61.3 billion in 2019, widening the trade
gap to $47 billion from $34.8 billion in 2018, according to Vietnamese
customs data. The U.S. Census Bureau reports a $55.8 billion trade
deficit with Vietnam for 2019 and $39.5 billion for 2018.
In
an interview last year, Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc promised that
Vietnam would buy more U.S. products, such as Boeing Co. aircraft. In
August, state-run Vietnam National Coal-Mineral Industries announced it
was negotiating to buy U.S. coal for the first time, from Xcoal Energy
& Resources LLC.
Vietnam
is cracking down on fake labeling of Chinese goods being routed through
its territory to bypass U.S. tariffs. Meanwhile, the central bank and
government ministries have vowed to address U.S. concerns about
Vietnam’s monetary policy and trade surplus with the U.S., after the
Treasury added Vietnam to a watchlist of countries being monitored for
possible currency manipulation.
U.S.
Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer said last year that Vietnam
needs to resolve “market access restrictions related to goods, services,
agricultural products, and intellectual property.”
Vietnam is working to address Lighthizer’s concerns, Tuan said.
“We
will work on changes in some relevant regulations to make it easier for
American companies to sell more in Vietnam,” he said. “We are trying to
create opportunities for businesses of the two countries to boost trade
exchange in a fair manner. This will surely help the bilateral
relations between Vietnam and the U.S.”
(Updates with quote from Tuan in fifth paragraph.)
To contact the reporter on this story: Nguyen Dieu Tu Uyen in Hanoi at uyen1@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: John Boudreau at jboudreau3@bloomberg.net, Michael S. Arnold
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