Current issues
In the wake of
đổi mới traditional Việt crafts industries began to find new markets in other Asian countries and also succeeded in diversifying with a view to meeting the growing demands of tourism. Unfortunately, many of these industries were hit by the recession of 1997, which dried up Asian markets and reduced spending by foreign visitors on traditional craft items. The resulting lowering of prices and wages brought hardship to the country's estimated 1.25 million crafts workers.
Since 1999 craft exports have successfully been revived, partly due to improved trade promotion and overseas marketing, but largely thanks to new government policies which permit local handicraft manufacturers to deal directly with overseas importers instead of having to trade via intermediaries.
In 2003 Việt Nam's handicrafts were exported to 133 countries and territories and amounted to more than US$350 million. In the first six months of 2003 exports had already reached US$180 million and the 2004 total brought some US$450 million, a year-on increase of over 22 per cent. The European Union is currently the biggest importer of 'made-in-Việt Nam' handicrafts (42 per cent), followed by Asia (33 per cent), North America (14 per cent) and various other markets; bamboo, reed and ceramic products account for the lion's share of Vietnamese craft exports. These figures do not include 'on-the-spot' exports - souvenirs bought by international visitors to Việt Nam.
Notwithstanding this recovery, profits continue to accrue mainly to a relatively small number of high-volume, low-cost mass production companies which produce pottery, bamboo-based products and wooden furniture, leaving many artisans in traditional craft villages without the raw materials, capital investment and long-term purchase orders to develop their activities significantly.
Other issues affecting future potential craft export earnings include lack of diversity in the design of Vietnamese craft products and growing difficulties accessing raw materials such as clay, rattan and bamboo from lowland areas which are increasingly being stripped bare for tilling.
The traditional craft industries of Việt Nam's ethnic minority communities have also attracted a steady increase in interest from foreign visitors over the past few years. However, as elsewhere in the region, the economic benefits of tourism have thus far been felt only by a small minority of actual craft producers, the bulk of the profits from foreign visitors' interest in traditional crafts accruing to enterprising middlemen. At the same time many craft producers amongst the culturally-vulnerable ethnic minority communities have become victims of the more negative effects of foreign tourism, eg being tempted to sell traditional artefacts of cultural significance to foreign visitors for short-term profit, abandoning centuries-old traditional skills in favour of turning out poor-quality tourist art, or even ceasing craft production altogether in favour of other, more lucrative sources of tourist-related income.
Since 1997 efforts have been made by the Hà Nội-based non-governmental organisation
Craft Link to help craft producers to benefit directly - both economically and culturally - from sales of their work to foreign visitors. This organisation has been working amongst poor and marginalised communities (particularly in the mountainous regions), helping to organise crafts persons into production units, providing them with the technical and design skills needed to create practical, high-quality products which can be sold to tourists, offering basic training in book-keeping and costing and helping them to find new markets through its shops and bazaars.
