Vietnam Trade Remedies: Proactive Stance for Exporters

Trade Remedies: Maintaining a Proactive Stance for Exporters

Facing the rise of trade remedy investigations from abroad, with the support of ministries, particularly the Ministry of Industry and Trade, enterprises have become more proactive in handling and responding to challenges.

Ensuring a Fair Trade Environment In 2025, the trend of trade protectionism continued to increase globally. There was a significant rise in the number of trade remedy (TR) investigations against Vietnam’s exports, coupled with unprecedented complexity and an increasingly diverse scope of investigation.

Exporting businesses proactively and effectively respond to trade defense investigations. (Illustrative image)

In this context, according to the report on trade remedy work in 2025 by the Trade Remedies Authority of Vietnam (TRAV) under the Ministry of Industry and Trade (MOIT), this field has been deployed synchronously and comprehensively, highlighted by many milestones.

Specifically, the work of advising, building, and perfecting legal normative documents on trade remedies was promoted. Notably, TRAV finalized and reported to the MOIT leadership to submit to the Government for approval and issuance of Decree 86/2025/ND-CP. This Decree aims to create a unified, flexible, and sufficiently strong legal basis for the investigation and application of trade remedy measures.

Simultaneously, to facilitate businesses and related parties, TRAV reviewed and reported to the Ministry leadership to cut 1 administrative procedure and continue implementing 2 Level-4 administrative procedures. Furthermore, the Online Database System for Trade Remedy Investigations (Trav Online) continued to be deployed effectively.

Particularly, in the context where many imported goods showed signs of dumping or subsidization causing serious injury to domestic manufacturing industries, the work of initiating lawsuits, investigating, and applying trade remedy measures continued to be strengthened. This promotes the establishment of an equal competitive environment and protects the legitimate interests of domestic production sectors.

2025 Domestic Investigation Highlights:

TRAV continued to investigate and review 9 cases initiated in 2024.
Initiated investigation of 2 new cases and 1 anti-circumvention case.
Initiated 4 sunset reviews and 2 annual reviews.
Received and processed 8 dossiers requesting new investigations and reviews.

Out of 58 investigation cases applying trade remedy measures to goods imported into Vietnam, 34 measures are currently in effect.

According to TRAV, these measures have contributed to ensuring a fair trade environment, preventing the negative impact of unfair imports on domestic production and the jobs of millions of workers, and ensuring economic security and social welfare across provinces. Notably, revenue from anti-dumping, countervailing, safeguard, and anti-circumvention duties contributed significantly to the state budget, totaling over 1,600 billion VND annually.

Boosting Support for Enterprises Conversely, as the production and export capacity of our economy grows, Vietnam’s exports increasingly face more trade remedy investigations from foreign countries. To date, there have been 298 trade remedy investigations from 25 markets and territories against Vietnam’s exports. In 2025 alone, Vietnamese exports faced 21 new trade remedy cases initiated by 11 markets.

Facing the risks of TR investigations, many activities to support enterprises during the case handling process were strengthened by management agencies. This includes:

Early warning for items at risk of investigation.
Providing information on investigation procedures and response scenarios.
Coordinating with associations and enterprises to engage with foreign investigating authorities to ensure Vietnam’s export industries are treated fairly according to World Trade Organization (WTO) regulations.

Thanks to these efforts, TRAV assesses that the business community’s awareness of trade remedies is gradually improving. Several industries and enterprises have proactively handled and responded to foreign investigations, leading to significant successes:

Canada: Concluded that semi-trailers imported from Vietnam did not circumvent trade remedy duties.
EU: A major Vietnamese enterprise enjoyed a 0% tax rate in the anti-dumping investigation on Hot Rolled Coil (HRC) steel imported from Vietnam.
USA: The preliminary review results for anti-dumping duties on honey were reduced significantly from 100.72% – 156.96% down to 6.72% – 21.55%.

Currently, TRAV monitors export fluctuations of over 422 items exported to 10 markets that frequently conduct TR investigations. Based on this, it assessed 27 product groups on the warning list for risks of TR investigation, anti-circumvention investigation, origin fraud, or illegal transshipment. This helps Ministries, sectors, localities, and businesses avoid being passive in responding to foreign measures.

Dispute Settlement and Future Orientation Regarding dispute settlement, advising on negotiations, implementing FTAs, and participating in the WTO framework, TRAV has acted as the plaintiff in 5 dispute settlement cases regarding trade remedy measures at the WTO (4 cases against the US and 1 against Indonesia). In these cases, TRAV strictly complied with all stages of WTO regulations while considering bilateral solutions. As a result, all 5/5 cases have been resolved at the WTO, mostly in favor of Vietnamese exporters.

2026 Outlook: In 2026, implementing the policy of proactively utilizing trade remedy measures to protect domestic industries in line with international commitments, TRAV identifies key directions:

Legal Monitoring: Continue researching and reporting on changes in foreign trade remedy laws, especially regulations likely to impact Vietnam significantly, to provide timely information.
Institutional Cooperation: Research and institutionalize cooperation mechanisms on trade remedies with foreign competent authorities; discuss specific cooperation contents with key trading partners to address tax evasion and circumvention issues.
Trend Analysis: Closely monitor protectionist trends and trade conflicts between countries to recommend timely response measures; focus on implementing Schemes related to trade remedy work.
Capacity Building: Promote activities to enhance the capacity of domestic manufacturing industries to utilize trade defense tools effectively.