According to the General Statistics Office, about only 200 CBU vehicles were imported into the country in February 2018, worth around US$14 million.
Specifically, import turnover of CBU vehicles in February is estimated to decline sharply in term of both quantity and value compared to the previous month.
The Decree No. 116/2017/ND-CP of the Government and the Circular No.03/2018/TT-BGTVT of the Ministry of Transport (MoT) are considered as the main reasons for this non-stopping decrease when automobile importers coping with difficulties in supplying VTA (vehicle type approval) certificate, emission tests, the establishment of an 800-meter testing road, etc.
The Vietnam Automobile Manufacturers’ Association (VAMA) has already submitted fourth letters of recommendation to the Government to remove the difficulties, saying that the provisions in the Decree are unreasonable.
"Decree No.116 has caused the import of automobiles into Vietnam to be interrupted. It has made the cost higher and time prolonged, which increased the price of imported cars," VAMA's representative said. "Decree No.116 creates unfairness between domestic automobile manufacturers and dealers and foreign investors. Many investors that have been operating for over 20 years in Vietnam even have to stop their operation because of the regulation on the testing road."
However, according to VAMA, the thing that the MoT approved the VTA certificate granted to vehicles imported from Thailand into Vietnam by Thai Government has partially removed the barrier on vehicles imported from ASEAN.
Many companies are urgently completing the procedures to import cars from Thailand, and awaiting for the issuance of VTA certificate from the competent authorities of Indonesia, Malaysia in the coming time. It is expected that the number of automobiles imported to Vietnam will increase again in the coming months.
