“Covid-19 has given e-commerce a push,” said Nguyen Thuy Anh from the Department of E-commerce and Digital Economy.
It not only has changed consumers’ behaviors, but also forced traditional retailers and manufacturers to go online.
Anh said he got home from Binh Dien Market at midnight and then had to go to the Vietnam Online Business Forum 2020 the next morning. He said the huge market is cumbersome and wants to carry out digital transformation and bring special products to e-commerce trading floors.
Binh Dien Market, covering 65 hectares, is considered the largest wholesale market in Vietnam. It is open from early in the morning to midnight, distributing thousands of tons of farm and seafood products every day.
Asked about the business performance before and after the pandemic, Vu Thi Anh Tuyet from online Lazada, one of the largest marketplaces, said the number of new sellers has increased by eight times, while sellers reported sharp increases in numbers of orders.
Sagrifood, one of the fresh food suppliers on Lazada, said the number of orders last week was 40 times higher than ordinary days as it was running a sale promotion program.
Nguyen Anh Dung from Nielsen Vietnam said Covid-19 has led to changes in awareness of consumers.
A Nielsen survey found that 64 percent of consumers would use food delivery service more regularly after the pandemic ends and 63 percent would buy things online more regularly.
The market analysis firm has advised businesses to expand online and D2C (direct to consumer) sale channels, change product catalogue, increase omni-channel sales and convey health and quality assurance messages.
In 2015, the Vietnam E-commerce Association (Vecom) predicted that 2015 would be the last year of the ‘e-commerce universalization’ period, and Vietnam’s e-commerce would enter a new development stage from 2016 with stable and rapid development.
Vecom’s Ecommerce Index Report 2020 showed that the period may last from 2016 to 2025.
Vecom found that in 2019, e-commerce saw a high growth rate of 32 percent. Meanwhile, the CAGR for the four-year period 2016-2019 was 30 percent.
The online retail of consumer goods and services had value of $11.5 billion in 2019. VECOM predicted that the growth rate of over 30 percent would continue in 2020 and Vietnam’s e-commerce value would exceed $15 billion.
Hanoi and HCM City made up 70 percent of e-commerce transacitons of the country though the two cities just account for 18 percent of total population. The remaining 61 cities/provinces just made up 30 percent of e-commerce value, though they account for 82 percent of population.
This article was originally published in VNA