CAN THO – The Vietnam Association of Seafood Exporters and Producers (VASEP) has expressed its disapproval over a draft decree on labelling, which requires export products to be labelled in line with the laws of Vietnam and the importing country.
In response to the Ministry of Science and Technology’s draft decree amending and supplementing Decree 43/2017 on product labelling, VASEP suggested removing export products from the scope of the decree’s amendments.
The association noted that labelling export items, which are not consumed in the local market, in accordance with Vietnam and the importing country’s laws is illogical, causes wastefulness for exporters and is not helpful to consumers. The regulation is also infeasible as there are certain differences between the laws of Vietnam and the importing country.
Regarding the regulation causing wastefulness for enterprises, VASEP cited an example of the local aquatic sector which exports millions of tons of aquatic items per year or the footwear sector exporting over one billion footwear items annually. It will cost the footwear sector an additional VND100 billion each year if exporters in the field have to change the labels for their export items as stipulated in the draft decree.
If all manufacturing sectors are forced to change the labels of export items, it will cost up to trillions of dong, it explained.
As for the infeasibility, the association said that many business partners were likely to disagree with the draft decree requesting the name of manufacturers to be labelled on the product in line with Vietnamese laws. Normally, only the name of importers, also known as owners, is displayed on the product label as per the regulations of the United States and Europe.
By Trung Chanh
