Two-way trade reached USD 3.12 billion in the period, showing a year-on-year rise of 14.2 percent. Of which, USD 2.73 billion came from Vietnam’s exports, up 14 percent.
Key export products include telephones and components, garment-textile, footwear, and seafood.
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Workers at a mobile phone production company in Vietnam. Photo for illustration |
Telephones and components topped the list with USD 1.08 billion, accounting for up to 40 percent of the country’s total exports.
Garment ranked second with nearly USD 348 million, up 4.8 percent against the same period last year, but making up only 2.6 percent of the country’s total garment exports.
Footwear exports to the UK reached USD 325 million, down 2.4 percent and accounting for a mere 4.2 percent of the country’s total footwear export value.
Three other exports to the UK which obtained an export value of more than USD 100 million each were seafood (USD 127 million), wood and timber products (USD 143 million), and electronics and components (USD 113 million).
In 2017, Vietnam’s shipments to the UK surged 10.7 percent to USD 5.4 billion, making the UK the eighth biggest importer of Vietnamese products, moving up one place compared to 2016.
Meanwhile, the country imported USD 739 million worth of goods from the UK, a slight increase of 2.1 percent.
Statistics showed that the UK was among the 15 biggest trade partners of Vietnam in the 2013-2017 period with bilateral trade increasing to 6USD .15 billion in 2017 from USD 4.27 billion in 2013.
Notably, Vietnam always ran a trade surplus with the European country in the period. Specifically, Vietnam exported USD 3.7 billion worth of goods to the UK in 2013, six times higher than imports. In 2014, Vietnam posted a trade surplus of USD 3 billion with the UK, which increased in the following years and hit USD 4.68 billion in 2017.
Source: VNA