Vietnam has a variety of opportunities to engage in trade with Russia, particularly in sectors such as agriculture, tourism, and textiles. This was expressed by Mr. Alexander Stuglev, Chairman of the Board of Directors and CEO of the Roscongress Fund, during a meeting on the sidelines of the Eastern Economic Forum (EEF) in Ho Chi Minh City on July 4.
The Roscongress Foundation, founded in 2007 by Russian President Vladimir Putin, is responsible for organizing annual economic events in the country. During this event, Mr. Stuglev highlighted potential areas of cooperation between Russia and Vietnam, including energy, transportation, construction, tourism, fashion, and information technology. He emphasized that Russia has a strong demand for agricultural investment and imports of agricultural products and also emphasized the opportunities for infrastructure development and textile consumption within the tourism industry.
For instance, it is projected that Russians will spend over $2.8 billion on fashion this year and by 2029 it is expected to reach $4.74 billion. Furthermore, in the first 10 months of 2023 Russia imported over $343 million worth of textiles and garments from Vietnam representing a 91% increase from the same period in 2022. In addition to this data provided by Mr. Stuglev also showed that Vietnam-Russia trade turnover last year reached $3.6 billion indicating a growth of 2.3% compared to the previous year with items like coffee electronics seafood rubbers among most exported goods while imports include coal fertilizer seafood meat from Russia .
The CEO of the Roscongress Foundation envisions that bilateral trade could reach $15-20 billion in the future due to numerous opportunities for collaboration. He noted that recent global geopolitical changes have presented new challenges and prospects for small and medium-sized enterprises on both sides. On Vietnamese side companies are expanding their presence in Russian market especially after Covid-19 pandemic .