VINACHEM

HCM CITY — Two-way trade turnover between Viet Nam and France is set to reach 1.99 billion euros (US$2.9 billion) by the year-end, says Pham Xuan Yen, Trade Counselor at the Vietnamese embassy in France.

The figure in the first nine months of the year rose 19 per cent against the corresponding period last year to cross 1.56 billion euros ($2.28 billion), the Econet bulletin reported yesterday.

It quoted Yen as saying that of the two-way trade figure for the first three quarters, Viet Nam's exports to France accounted for more than a billion euros ($1.46), a year-on-year increase of 11.5 per cent over the corresponding period last year.

Yen said that export turnover of seafood, which has great potential in the French market, was likely to rise by 34 per cent against last year.

The export of footwear, garments and textiles to France reached 176.8 million euros ($258 million) while that of household utensils reached 97.3 million euros ($142 million) in the first nine months of the year.

During the same period, Viet Nam imported aircraft equipment, pharmaceutical products, machinery, electronics and chemical products worth more than 509 million euros ($743 million), a year-on-year increase of 38.2 per cent. —VNS