Socialist Republic of Vietnam

Ha Noi, May 31 (VNA) -- Cooperation among ASEAN countries' textile and garment industries in their process of integration into AFTA (ASEAN Free Trade Area) was the theme of a conference, the first of its kind in Viet Nam so far, held in Ha Noi on May 31.

At the conference, President of the Viet Nam Textile and Garment Association Le Quoc An noted that the participant focused their discussion on cooperation and exchange of information to help each other renew technology and equipment and train officials of economic and market management to raise the region's competitiveness and create favourable conditions for ASEAN countries' textile and garment industries joining AFTA.

He further said that ASEAN has to become a strong socio-economic bloc with a high competitiveness of textiles and garments to attract world customers' attention.

Viet Nam's textile and garment industry posted an export turnover of USD 1.9 billion in 2000, ranking second after the oil and gas industry.

Of the figure, USD 58.77 million was from exports to ASEAN countries, accounting for 3.11 percent of the sector's export turnover.

Viet Nam also imported USD 41.1 million worth of textiles and garments from ASEAN countries, accounting for 9.2 percent of its import value of such items.

By integrating into the regional economy through CEPT (Common Effective Preferential Tariff) programme, Vietnamese textile and garment enterprises will have the opportunity to develop strongly in the future.

At the conference, Viet Nam called for more assistance from region countries in training officials of economic and market management and expressed the hope to receive more quotas for its textile and garment industry.--VNA.