Spending billions of USD for importing pharmaceuticals every year

Chart of import turnover of pharmaceuticals of five largest markets in total import turnover nationwide as of July 2017. Graph: T.Bình

The latest figure as of 15/8, the whole country spent $US 1.712 billion in importing pharmaceuticals, increased 5.8% over the same period in 2016. The main import markets of this product are Germany, France, India, Korea, Italy, UK, Belgium, USA ...

In particular, according to the latest statistics of the import market of the General Department of Vietnam Customs, by the end of July, there are five import markets for pharmaceutical products valued at $US 100 million and over.

In the first rank is Germany with turnover reached $US 187.7 million; the second place is France with $US 180 million; next is India with $US 164.4 million; South Korea with $US 111 million; Italy with $US 102.5 million. The total import turnover of these five major markets accounted for 46.6% of whole country's import turnover in the same period.

Meanwhile, in 2016, Vietnam spent $US 2.563 billion in import pharmaceuticals, and this figure is $US 2.32 billion and $US 2.035 billion in 2015 and 2014 respectively. In recent years, the pharmaceutical is one of the groups that are worth "billion dollars" in import turnover of Vietnam.