South Korean companies' investment in Vietnam plummet by 70% in Q1

Recently, the World Trade Organization (WTO) released the "Global Trade Outlook and Statistics" report. It is expected that the global merchandise trade volume will grow by 1.7% this year, which is lower than last year and the average growth rate of the past 12 years.

Several major Asian exporters released new export data before this report was published. Exports from South Korea and Vietnam continued to decline due to weak demand in Europe and the United States. South Korea's exports fell for six consecutive months year-on-year.

According to data released by the South Korean Ministry of Trade, South Korea's exports fell by 13.6% year-on-year in Mar, the sixth consecutive month of decline. The export to the United States rose 32.1% to $30 billion US dollars, the export to China fell 31.9% to $2.66 billion US dollars, and the export to the European Union rose 14.5% to $1.57 billion.

In addition to South Korea, Vietnam's export data is not very optimistic. According to data released by the Vietnamese government at the end of Mar, Vietnam's exports in the first quarter of 2023 fell by 11.9% year-on-year.

Vietnam is one of the world's largest exporters of clothing, footwear and furniture. However, Tran Thi Thu, deputy director of the General Account Statistics Department of the Statistics Bureau of Vietnam, revealed that in the first quarter of this year, Vietnam's textile and footwear orders fell by 70% to 80% year-on-year.

According to data from Vietnam's Ministry of Planning and Investment, from Jan to Mar this year, South Korean companies invested a total of $474 million US dollars in Vietnam, down 70.4% from a year earlier.

The data also showed that Vietnam's overall foreign investment in the first quarter fell 38.3% year-on-year to about $5.4 billion US dollars, almost half of the first-quarter level of 2019.