HCM CITY — Good logistics management, both by governments and businesses, will help enhance competitiveness and growth, Lương Hoàng Thái, director general of the Ministry of Industry and Trade’s Department of Multilateral Trade Policy, has said.

Speaking at a workshop on promoting the integration of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) into services-logistics global value chains (GVCs) in HCM City on Saturday, he said: “Logistics is an integral part of global value chains. Since logistics are involved in a variety of areas such as sourcing and procurement, order fulfillment, storage of raw materials, production planning, scheduling, controlling cost effective flow, assembly, packaging, maintenance, warehousing, distribution, finished goods, customers service and others, there is huge room for SMEs’ involvement and their deep integration is inevitable.”

The workshop, organised by the Ministry of Industry and Trade and the APEC International Secretariat, was aimed at gaining a deeper understanding of logistics as an important service industry and SMEs’ participation in logistics as part of GVCs in the services industry.

“The workshop contributes to … facilitating SMEs in logistics through sharing challenges, experiences and best practices as well as making recommendations on strategies and policies to facilitate SMEs’ integration into logistics GVCs, and last but not least enhancing SMEs’ participation in logistics for their own development.”

At the workshop, experts and APEC officials spoke about the challenges facing SMEs’integration in logistics with a focus on policies and regulations.

They also shared experiences on how governments’policies and regulations can support SMEs participation in logistics.

A more in-depth understanding of the outsourcing process, its advantages and disadvantages as well as experiences in dealing with challenges raised from outsourcing were also discussed.

The one-day workshop also highlighted issues in supply chain management and SMEs’ capability in management and development.

Corazon C Curay of the Philippines told Việt Nam News on the sidelines: “We would like to share our experience, our challenges, policies that need to be enacted by the Government. With the help of APEC we can push this reform though I know the Government is now doing something about it, and we are happy that we are moving forward.

“I just read that we are the 10th fastest growing economy in the world, and that translates already to the SMEs. It is a good thing also that in the global competitiveness report, all the measures are up except logistics, so the Government is focusing on that.”    

The workshop was organised following the APEC 2014 GVCs blueprint and the initiative on promoting SMEs’ integration into GVCs in major industries in 2016 as well as responding to APEC ministers’ instructions to further work and develop initiatives in promoting SMEs’ integration in GVCs.

The workshop’s recommendations will be submitted to Committee of Trade and Investment (CTI) for further follow-up capacity building activities.

In the last decade APEC has made great efforts in translating its regional economic and technical co-operation into concrete activities to further benefit the business community and people through addressing emerging issues that affect business.

Of them, GVCs development and co-operation and promotion of SMEs’ integration into GVCs are high on agenda and supported by the APEC member economies via a chain of initiatives and activities that directly target and facilitate SMEs as key drivers of the global economy. — VNS