VietNamNet Bridge - The amount of money Vietnamese spent in the first four months of the year to import cars, from budget models to luxury vehicles, increased sharply. 

According to the General Statistics Office (GSO), Vietnam imported 9,000 cars in complete built unit (CBU) in April, a sharp increase of 4,000 cars compared with the same period last year. 

As such, Vietnam has imported 34,000 cars this year, an increase of 125 percent.

Thoi Bao Kinh Te Sai Gon reported that Vietnam had to spend $833 million for imports, up by three times over the corresponding period last year. The high import turnover has far exceeded the level predicted by analysts.

The GSO’s report showed that CBU cars was saw the highest import turnover increase in the first four months of the year.

The sharp increase in car import turnover led to total import turnover increasing significantly by 20 percent compared to the same period last year. There was an 8 percent increase in export turnover. 

This was one of the reasons behind the trade deficit of $3 billion in the first four months of the year. The trade deficit was $2 billion in the first four months of 2014.

Analysts commented that if the CBU car imports continue such increases, CBU would dominate the domestic automobile market, but not by 2018, when the import tariff reduces to zero percent.

In 2014, Vietnam imported 72,000 CBU cars worth $1.57 billion, an increase of 103.8 percent in quantity and 117.3 percent in value if compared with 2013. 

The imports were believed to account for 50 percent of the total number of cars sold in the market.

According to the Vietnam Automobile Manufacturers’ Association (VAMA), 157,800 cars were sold in 2014, up by 43 percent over 2013. Meanwhile, 48,707 cars were sold in the first three months of 2015, up 62 percent over the same period last year.

Mot The Gioi quoted its sources as reporting that Vietnamese favor the imported cars from South Korea. About 6,050 cars were imported from the market in the first three months of the year. 

Car imports have been increasing sharply due to increasingly high demand in the domestic market and the weaker competitiveness of locally assembled cars as the import tariff cut plan is being implemented.

While government agencies refuse to comment about the implementation of the automobile industry development strategy, economists all have said that the strategy has failed.

Bui Ngoc Son, a renowned economist, said Vietnam had many great opportunities to develop its automobile industry, but was unable to grab them.

Thanh Mai