The Impact of Agricultural Sector Characteristics on Agricultural Export Activities

China's market is characterized by very specific technical standards, especially the very strict technical barriers to food products of this market.

In addition, the complex distribution system of the Chinese market also requires enterprises exporting to this market to have good relationships with intermediary importers through associations and industries. Moreover, high costs of trade promotion, market research, and administrative procedures built according to the requirements of competent authorities are also causing many difficulties for enterprises wishing to promote official agricultural exports to the Chinese market.

Regarding trade promotion, on December 30, 2020, the Ministry of Industry and Trade issued Decision No. 3538/QD-BCT approving the National Trade Promotion Program and the Vietnam National Brand Program in 2021, including 170 projects of the host units, with a total approved budget of 143 billion VND, including organizing conferences and international forums to promote trade and connect NS exports, trade to the Chinese market for Vietnamese NS export enterprises.

In May 2021, the Trade Promotion Agency coordinated with Chinese trade representative agencies in China to organize the 2021 Vietnam - China Agricultural and Food Products Online Trade Conference to support Vietnamese enterprises to promote the export of agricultural and food products to the Chinese market. The conference is a favorable opportunity for Vietnamese agricultural and food production enterprises, especially enterprises in Phu Tho province, to access potential markets, connect and promote promising business opportunities to Chinese enterprises and consumers.

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The Department of Trade Promotion, Ministry of Industry and Trade issued Official Dispatch No. 2689/XTTM-CSXT dated October 21, 2020, supporting information on promoting Vietnamese agricultural exports and connecting trade by providing information on the Long Ngo imported vegetable and fruit wholesale market in Shanghai and the ability to promote the export of Vietnamese agricultural and fruit products to the East China market and the whole of China through this wholesale market.

Previously, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development and the People's Committee of Quang Ninh province organized a conference to connect the export of agricultural, forestry and fishery products to the Chinese market at the end of 2019. There were more than 300 Vietnamese booths and 100 Chinese booths present to seek and expand cooperation opportunities, introduce products, export and develop sustainably. In addition, the two sides signed

Some agreements on linkage, trade clearance support, facilitating agricultural import and export.

In May 2019, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development organized a forum to promote Vietnamese agricultural products in Liaoning, China, with the participation of more than 100 Vietnamese and Chinese agricultural enterprises, including more than 60 Chinese enterprises. Here, the two sides shared information on agricultural investment and the potential for developing agricultural trade between the two sides. In addition, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development proposed that the Chinese side accelerate the process of opening the market for Vietnamese fruits such as durian, passion fruit, avocado, grapefruit, coconut, custard apple, rose apple and bird's nest products through the trade channel, sweet potatoes. For aquatic products, Vietnam continues to propose that China accelerate the process of opening the market for clams, tilapia, crab, and tuna.

Participating in fairs is not only a way to promote products but also an opportunity for agricultural export enterprises to directly meet Chinese partners. However, on the Chinese side, fairs do not only take place in big cities but also in almost all provinces of China, so regular participation to introduce agricultural products is considered difficult for Vietnamese agricultural export enterprises of medium and small scale. In addition, participating in events is difficult to bring immediate practical results because partners need time to analyze, compare and evaluate the agricultural products of enterprises. Therefore, in addition to actively participating in exhibitions and investment promotion fairs, it is also necessary to pay attention to opening product introduction offices in some cities, especially provinces and cities sharing borders, places with great potential for cooperation. According to the author's research, Vietnamese seafood export enterprises currently still tend to wait for "traders" to come to them instead of proactively seeking markets.

In addition, when choosing partners, Vietnamese enterprises also need to pay attention to the negotiation and contract signing process to avoid unnecessary risks. These risks are related to information sources about foreign traders that are not thoroughly investigated; the terms in the contract are not strict. The reason

The main cause of the above incidents is that many Vietnamese agricultural export enterprises often do not pay attention to the fact that they are transacting with one person but when signing a contract, they are with another legal entity that they do not know clearly. When they cannot collect the money for the goods, a dispute occurs, the partner who is in charge of the transaction only accepts to be the agent of the legal entity that signed the import contract and does not take legal responsibility; when contacting the partner who is the legal entity that signed the contract, they cannot be contacted, leading to Vietnamese agricultural export enterprises often suffering losses... Agricultural products exported in large quantities have high contract values, and are also food products, so foreign partners (fraudulent) will easily focus on the issue of product quality to reject the goods.

(2) Relationship between export enterprises and product suppliers

This is a relationship considered vital to the export business, including the supply, price, quality, and quantity of goods that the export business needs. However, this relationship is not favorable due to many subjective and objective factors.

Objective factors such as Vietnam is currently one of the countries most affected by climate change in the world, for example, the prolonged drought in the Mekong Delta has affected the quality and output of the largest rice granary in Vietnam, or the severe flooding in Central Vietnam in 2019 has affected the output of some exported fruits. The impact of climate change on Vietnam's agricultural production has become the biggest challenge, causing many risks for enterprises producing and exporting agricultural products.

In the context of the Covid-19 pandemic, in August 2021, the Ministry of Industry and Trade organized an online conference to connect consumption and promote the export of agricultural and aquatic products in the Southern and Central Highlands regions in 2021 to remove difficulties in agricultural product consumption in this region. The conference was attended by functional agencies, industry associations, business support organizations, representatives of distribution channels, e-commerce platforms, domestic import-export purchasing enterprises, more than 200 foreign importers, over 200 enterprises, cooperatives producing, processing, supplying agricultural products and food in the Southern and Central Highlands regions. The amount of agricultural products produced in this region is

very large: nearly 05 million tons of rice; 3.7 million tons of vegetables and fruits; more than 04 million tons of fruits such as: dragon fruit, durian, avocado, longan, mango, grapefruit, coffee, pineapple, cocoa...; about

120,000 tons of seafood; 80,000 tons of live pigs; 600,000 tons of chicken meat and about 400 million eggs... However, the epidemic has greatly affected the production and business activities of enterprises and production and business households due to increased production costs, reduced workers, reduced factory capacity; disrupted circulation and transportation, prolonged export transportation time, goods waiting at ports are slow to export due to lack of ships, lack of empty containers, shipping fees increase many times... Accordingly, local working groups regularly coordinate closely with functional agencies to grasp the needs, update the situation in each case and promptly connect with associations, industries, distribution corporations, domestic and international export purchasing enterprises to support the consumption of agricultural products for localities.

In addition to the above reasons, the subjective factor comes from the relationship between the agricultural export enterprises and the supply source which is not yet sustainable. Many agricultural export enterprises are not really interested in linking production. Prices and input supply for agricultural export business are also issues that need to be improved. Due to the small and fragmented scale of agricultural production in Vietnam, lacking a chain production model, leading to limitations in the production organization stage, which does not really meet all requirements, especially export requirements, causing difficulties in investment planning, quality management and consumption. Although some programs have been implemented such as: Large-scale model fields... however, the majority of agricultural production households in Vietnam are still small-scale farmers. This makes the price of agricultural production high, the quality of Vietnamese agricultural products and fruits is not guaranteed, the designs are uneven... sometimes the agricultural product suppliers are willing to break previously signed contracts just for immediate benefits.

(3) The relationship between agricultural export enterprises and managers

The relationship between enterprises and management agencies is mentioned in the survey results. This is an equally important indicator in the business relationship factor. Relations with management agencies on policies give enterprises the advantage of quick access to information, and obtaining fast and new information. With the current information system, it is very

Many Vietnamese textile and garment export enterprises must go through personal relationships to access the necessary information for their export activities.

Therefore, the relationship with the agencies directly affecting the export process of enterprises creates advantages for enterprises in terms of time to carry out export activities. For Vietnamese enterprises exporting agricultural products to the Chinese market, having a quick approval process for customs clearance procedures or obtaining an export license quickly is important due to the characteristics of agricultural products that are easily damaged and difficult to preserve.

According to the research results, the relationship between enterprises and management agencies is an important factor affecting the export activities of the interviewed enterprises. Almost all interviewed enterprises agreed that the government's facilitation of enterprises in export activities is really helpful.

The story of rice export quotas to China during the recent Covid-19 pandemic is a typical example of the relationship between enterprises and management agencies when some rice export enterprises had information to register the list of rice exporters overnight, while many other enterprises did not have this information. At the time the Government continued to allow rice exports with limited quotas, there were nearly 300,000 tons of rice from dozens of rice export enterprises that had previously signed rice export contracts with foreign partners gathered at ports waiting to be loaded onto export ships. However, most of these rice export enterprises did not grasp the information about the time when the General Department of Customs system allowed customs declarations to be opened, so they did not have time to complete the procedures, while many enterprises that had not signed contracts or prepared goods were able to register and were granted export licenses. Departments of Industry and Trade of provinces and cities, the Ministry of Industry and Trade, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development and

For rural development, the General Department of Customs needs to have appropriate policy mechanisms to quickly provide information to businesses, helping businesses have the opportunity to access information fairly.

3.2.5.5. Impact of agricultural sector characteristics on agricultural export activities

More than 70% of interviewed agricultural export enterprises said that the characteristics of the agricultural sector affect the export performance of Vietnamese agricultural export enterprises to the Chinese market. The characteristics of the agricultural sector are reflected in the development of the agricultural sector.

develop or not develop.

According to the USDA (2015) and OECD/FAO (2015) reports, agricultural consumption will increase sharply. Consumption of cereals, oilseeds, and livestock products will increase sharply and mainly come from low- and middle-income countries. The main driving factors include population growth, income growth, urbanization, and dietary diversification. The potential for expanding arable land remains mainly in South America. In contrast, land and resource constraints are limited in the Asia-Pacific region. In the coming decade, investment in large-scale agricultural projects will decrease because agricultural prices will no longer be attractive to investors, China is the only country where production is forecast to not increase.

Agriculture has always been a key sector in Vietnam's economic development. Under the attention and direction of the authorities at all levels, Vietnam's agriculture has developed towards sustainable growth, ensuring "increasing value, reducing input". The Agricultural Restructuring Project approved by the Government in June 2013 clearly indicated the shift in this strategy. The strong shift in the agricultural sector has brought certain benefits to Vietnamese agricultural export enterprises. Supply is more assured thanks to suitable models such as the "Large-scale field" model, "Closed production, trade, processing and distribution chain", "New-style cooperatives", "High-tech enterprises in agriculture"; or organizations on the scale of agricultural service cooperatives, joint-stock enterprises... The emergence and development of new production organization models in agriculture suitable to the specific conditions of each region and each type of product. Farmers and agricultural export enterprises play a key role in the agricultural product value chain through production and product consumption.

Thanks to the policy of prioritizing the best land for rice cultivation and irrigation areas to ensure food security, annual rice production has increased steadily even when facing adverse weather conditions. This has contributed to the stable growth of the industry. From 1990-2010, rice production increased from 19.2 million tons to 40 million tons, thanks to the irrigation system covering the entire area, allowing farmers in the Mekong Delta to cultivate 2-3 crops per year and rice production is stable, meeting the supply for export. (Jaffe et al. 2012)

However, the shrinking of agricultural land due to environmental change or increased demand for other industries is also posing new challenges to the agricultural sector.

In addition, the development of the agricultural processing industry has not met the actual requirements and expectations, and has revealed shortcomings and bottlenecks in the agricultural production value chain such as: the processing capacity of some product lines is still low, not meeting the requirements of raw material production and consumption markets. In addition, agricultural processing technology is not high, mainly raw products, the rate of value-added products is still low (generally 15 - 20%), the variety of processed products is not rich, and post-harvest losses are still high.

The organization of production - processing and consumption linkages is still loose, not creating a close connection between the processing industry, raw material production and consumption markets. In 2019, the export turnover of fruits and vegetables reached more than 3.7 billion USD, but Vietnam mainly exported raw materials. The rate of raw materials put into processing is low, only about 5 - 10%, of which the average design capacity utilization rate is 56.2%.

According to statistics from the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, the country has over 150 industrial-scale fruit and vegetable processing facilities with a total design capacity of over

1,000,000 tons of products/year, concentrated in 28 provinces/cities. The number of small and medium-sized agricultural, forestry and fishery processing establishments, households account for about 95% of the establishments. The equipment renewal coefficient is only 7%/year, only 1/2 to 1/3 of other countries.

Notably, some processing facilities of some industries are over 15 years old, have old equipment, outdated technology, consume a lot of raw materials, energy, and have low productivity. Post-harvest losses are still large, depending on the industry but generally fluctuate from 10 - 20%.

In the context of the Covid-19 pandemic seriously affecting agricultural production and processing, the Vietnamese government is creating more favorable mechanisms and policies for enterprises to restore and develop production. Recently, the Ministry of Planning and Investment is seeking opinions on the draft Decree on policies to encourage enterprises to invest in agriculture and rural areas to replace Decree No. 57/2018/ND-CP. Some notable contents in the draft aim to create a favorable environment to attract enterprises to invest in agricultural, forestry and fishery production.

in rural areas such as exemption and reduction of land rent for agricultural projects, support for agricultural investment credit. Although not yet official, the draft decree has received many comments for completion from people and businesses.

3.2.5.6. Characteristics of domestic market

75% of agricultural export enterprises surveyed said that the domestic market has certain impacts on the export activities of agricultural export enterprises. Favorable legal and economic environment, and active export support policies help export activities. Since the reform and opening up, the Government has always actively reformed a favorable legal and economic environment for agricultural development.

(1) Stable legal and economic environment, favorable policies to support agricultural development mainly aim at ensuring food security, economic growth and export. According to the congresses, the Government has built and developed a 10-year socio-economic development strategy for the period 2011-2020, making Vietnam a modern industrialized country. Including activities related to agriculture such as:

Increase investment in agriculture and rural economy

Perfecting the policy mechanism to innovate the operations of craft villages towards sustainable development.

The rice area maintained to ensure food security under the condition that Vietnam is seriously affected by climate change is 3.8 million hectares.

In addition, with the goal of moving towards sustainable agriculture, the Prime Minister has approved the agricultural restructuring plan through Decision No. 899/2013/QD-TTg, including a number of contents:

Maintain agricultural growth rate and enhance competitiveness by improving quality and added value to further meet consumer needs.

Improve farmers' lives, reduce poverty rates, and ensure food security requirements.

Raise awareness of protecting natural resources and minimizing environmental impacts.

In the coming time, with Decision No. 255/QD-TTg on approving the basic plan