| With many common things in culture, history, natural condition etc., China-Vietnam relations have been very close and can even be considered “friendship”. Since the normalization of the relations in 1991, we have seen clear improvements in bilateral exchanges and mutual politic trust. Especially in 1999, the leaders came to sign the Joint Declaration to determine the “16 words guidelines” for the development of China-Vietnam relations, which are “Long-term stability, future-oriented, good-neighborliness and comprehensive cooperation”. Ever since, the two countries’ politic, economic and cultural relations have gained tremendous and comprehensive developments. Up to now, the China-Vietnam relations are still in a good momentum of development, also known as “4 good relations”(good neighbors, good friends, good partners, good comrades). Close politic relations have laid a stable foundation for the development of trade between China and Vietnam.While the bilateral trade volume only reached $32 million in 1991; in 1995, the number surmounted the threshold of $1 billion to reach $1.052 billion and $1,435 billion in 1997. In only 7 years, trade volume had increased by 44.8 times, equivalent to 40% per year. In 1998, affected by the Asian Financial Crisis, the Sino-Vietnam trade had declined, but then quickly recovered in 1999, when total trade volume went up back to the pre-crisis level. Since 2000, along with the establishment of China-ASEAN Free Trade Area(CAFTA) and the event of the two countries joining the WTO, annual bilateral trade volume has annually risen with the rate of two-digit number(except for the year of 2008). The trade corporation between the two countries can be seen as a high-speed train to have gone onto the right track. In 2000, the bilateral trade volume between China and Vietnam extended to $2.466 billion, which has become the basis for leaders of the two countries to set the goal of $5 billion USD of bilateral trade volume by 2005. In just 3 years later, by 2003, the number had reached $4.634 billion and by 2005 had been $8.19 billion, which is 1.63 times of the expected number with average annual growth of 25.3%. In 2006, the volume came up to $9.95 billion, approaching the level of $10 billion. In 2007, the number achieved $15.115 billion with the growth of 52%, the fastest developing rate since 1993. In additional, since 2004, China has been the biggest trade partner of Vietnam for 8 years in a row. In 2008 and 2009, despite the effects of the Global Finance Crisis, the bilateral trade volume between China and Vietnam still grew up(28.8% and 8.2%). In 2010, along with the establishment of CAFTA, tariff between the two countries’ border has been cancelled and there was a boost to be seen in Sino-Vietnam trade relations. China and Vietnam has completed the goal of $25 billion that leaders set before. In reality, the amount reached $300.9 billion and $40.2 billion in 2011(increased 33.6%). China remains to be Vietnam’s biggest trade partner as well as exporter, and also surpasses Japan, claiming the 2nd biggest importer. At the same time, Vietnam is China’s 21 st biggest trade partner, 16 th biggest exporter and 21 st biggest importer of China.However, the trade relations between China and Vietnam still face big challenges. Because of the similarity in economy development stage, location and climate conditions, etc., China and Vietnam have big similarity in exporting, which make them have to compete with each other in international market. Therefore, it is essential to study the complementation and competitiveness of commodity trade, as well as policies to stimulate the trade relations between China and Vietnam.This article uses Revealed comparative advantage index, Export similarity to analyze the competitiveness of China-Vietnam commodity trade from Comparative advantage and Competition in the trade structure aspects; also uses Trade complementarity index, trade intensity index, Intra-industry trade index to study the complementation from Structure matching and Intra-industry trade aspects. The study points out that the two’s export market and items structures, not superior products, are similar, at the same time they have many badges of complement products, which means the complementation of China-Vietnam trade is very strong. Besides, the level of the intra-industry trade in the two countries is still low, the trade patterns are mainly inter-industry trade. Nevertheless, between 2000 and 2009, the Intra-industry trade level showed a high-speed development trend. The conclusion of the study shows that the complementation of China-Vietnam trade is far stronger than the competitiveness. In 62 chapters of products of The 3rd International Classification of standards, complementation products are 27(43.5%), competitiveness products are 6(9.7%); Inter-industry complement products are 21(33.8%). Yet there are only 9 of 62(14.5%) chapters of products are strongly competitiveness products. Visibly, in China-Vietnam trade relations, the nature of complementary surpasses the competitiveness, and the prospects of the development of trade relations are very optimistic. Leaders of the two countries should continue to promote the trade communications to achieve common development by taking some measures such as: further developing China-Vietnam trade in goods as a whole industry trade, speeding up in adjusting the bilateral trade structure, optimizing the international market structure, further strengthening trade cooperation, and actively participate in the establishment and implementation of the China-ASEAN Free Trade Area(CAFTA). In addition, this thesis also makes some recommendations to Chinese and Vietnamese enterprise to contribute more to the sustainable development of the Sino-Vietnam trade relations at the same time of earning vital interests. |
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