Vietnam products for domestic use no longer labeled as “Made in Vietnam”

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Vietnamese products for domestic use would no longer be labeled “Made in Vietnam” or “Product of Vietnam” in English but in Vietnamese, according to the Ministry of Industry and Trade (MoIT).

Among Vietnamese, there is no need for foreign language as means of communication, stated a representative of the MoIT in a press briefing on August 14 on the ministry’s latest draft circular providing guidance for the identification of Vietnamese products.

In case of imported products stating its origin as from Vietnam, custom authorities would require importers for evidence of such declaration before clearance.

The draft circular regulates that made-in-Vietnam products should be originated or wholly produced in Vietnam, including agricultural products or natural resources. Otherwise, products should undergo final processing or manufacturing in Vietnam to fundamentally change the essential qualities of the products to be labeled as such.

Moreover, products would be required to qualify for HS code transformation, an internationally standardized system of names and numbers to classify traded products, and certain amount of added-value to be considered Vietnamese products, such as having 30% of localization rate and being processed in Vietnam.

Therefore, some products may qualify for ASEAN’s rules of origin but not seen as Vietnamese ones, stated the MoIT. The 30%-localization rate criterion aims to prevent a product, although recognized worldwide as Vietnamese, from being denied its Vietnamese origin on its home soil, it added.

Regarding the HS code transformation, enterprises are allowed to use 100% imported materials during the production process to manufacture made-in-Vietnam products, as long as such process is more than just basic processing, such as packaging, classifying, cleaning, storing, assembling, among others.

Companies, therefore, are not permitted to label their products as “assembled in Vietnam”, “designed by Vietnam” or “processed in Vietnam”. They have to chose one among the labels “products of Vietnam”, “Vietnamese products”, “produced in Vietnam”, “Vietnam produces”, among others.