Vietnam showcases its goods in France

Saigon Times Online quoted French supermarket chain Big C Vietnam as saying the Vietnamese Goods Week was being jointly organized by the Vietnamese Ministry of Industry and Trade, Big C Vietnam, and its holding company Groupe Casino.

Some 200 items, including fruits and processed and frozen foods, will be on sale until November 19.

Other products such as rice and handicrafts are also on display.

Big C said all supermarket employees would be wearing red T-shirts saying “Vietnam in Paris” and traditional conical hats.

Vietnamese sent to the event would be wearing the ao dai and hand out leaflets to customers, it said.

At the opening ceremony the Vietnamese ambassador to France, Duong Chi Dung, had hailed the organizers’ initiative in organizing the event, the first of its kind, newswire VietnamPlus reported.

It was a good opportunity for Vietnamese businesses to access the French market, Vietnam’s second biggest in Europe, he said.

“Vietnam is also an attractive market for French entrepreneurs and investors,” he said.

Dang Hoang Hai, head of the ministry’s European Market Agency, said the promotion was one of many major projects to be jointly undertaken with Big C Vietnam to help Vietnamese manufacturers and distributors reach out to French and European partners and consumers.

It would also lay the ground for similar events to be held in other places in France, where more than 300,000 overseas Vietnamese and thousands of Vietnamese students lived, he said.

“We are also planning to organize similar events in Germany in March and April next year.”