Walmart sourcing executive seeking Vietnamese goods

Bill Foudy, vice president of Home and Apparel at Walmart Global Sourcing based in Hong Kong, said at a meeting with Deputy Prime Minister Vu Van Ninh that Walmart’s representative office in Vietnam, which opened last June, is researching Vietnamese supplies for its outlets in Canada, Chile, Mexico and China, the government website reported.

Foudy also said Walmart will support Vietnam’s interests in the Trans-Pacific Partnership deal, which is coming to its final round of negotiations between Vietnam, the US, and ten other countries.

Ninh said Vietnam will make it convenient for Walmart to do business in the country, which in turn will boost local production and the quality of local products.

Vietnam’s trade counselor in the US, Dao Tran Nhan, told local media last month that the embassy would continue making efforts to persuade Walmart to sell Vietnamese products.

Nhan said Vietnam’s Trade Commission in San Francisco has plans to invite the vice president of the chain to Vietnam to join talks with related ministries and trade agencies.

The commission last year managed to invite representatives of Kroger, the US’s second-leading retailer which operates 2,400 supermarkets for a total revenue of US$94 billion a year, to meet with 128 businesses in Ho Chi Minh City. It signed memorandums of understanding with some of them.

Walmart operates 11,000 outlets worldwide, including locations in China, Japan and India, turning a revenue of nearly $470 billion in the financial year 2013.

Source Thanhniennews