Leveraging Trade Policy for Climate Change Adaptation in Viet Nam’s Agricultural Sector
This report examines how trade policy can support climate change adaptation in Viet Nam's agricultural sector. Drawing on field research across eight provinces, it identifies the adaptation goods and services needed to advance national adaptation priorities, analyzes trade barriers affecting access to them, and proposes recommendations to strengthen coordination between trade and adaptation policy-makers.
Policy Recommendations
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Identifying adaptation goods and services requires a highly contextualized approach. Viet Nam should establish and regularly review a list of adaptation goods and services for the agricultural sector.
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The role of trade in supporting climate adaptation in Viet Nam’s agricultural sector is significant and still underexplored. Viet Nam could explore establishing a formal mechanism of cooperation between key agencies to regularly review the interaction between trade policy and adaptation priorities.
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Instead of tariffs, non-tariff barriers appear to represent the more significant trade barrier for many adaptation goods. Trade policy-makers could adjust trade policy to facilitate the importing of needed adaptation goods and services.
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More work is needed to distinguish which adaptation goods and services are likely to depend on imports. Analyzing barriers to adaptation services—particularly climate information, early warning systems, and insurance services—deserves further attention.
This report explores how trade policy can support climate change adaptation in Viet Nam's agricultural sector. Drawing on desk research, stakeholder consultations, and field research conducted across eight provinces, it identifies the adaptation goods and services most relevant to the country's agricultural adaptation priorities and examines the trade barriers that may affect access to them.
As climate change is increasingly affecting Viet Nam's agricultural sector through rising temperatures, changing precipitation patterns, droughts, floods, saline intrusion, and more frequent extreme weather events, the country seeks to implement its national adaptation plan. Access to the goods and services needed for adaptation will be critical. International trade can help meet these needs by facilitating access to relevant goods and specialized services, including technologies—from modern seed technology to material for efficient irrigation systems.
The report finds that non-tariff barriers, regulatory requirements, and restrictions affecting services can create challenges for the movement of adaptation goods and services. It highlights opportunities for adaptation policy-makers to more explicitly identify adaptation goods and services needs, as well as for trade policy-makers to support adaptation through more systematic consideration of adaptation priorities in trade policy processes.
The report concludes with practical recommendations for Viet Nam's government agencies, especially the ministries of trade as well as environment and agriculture. They include improving coordination between trade and adaptation policy-makers, establishing mechanisms to identify and regularly review adaptation goods and services, facilitating access to priority adaptation goods and services, and leveraging international cooperation to support climate-resilient agricultural development.
Participating experts
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