Foreign milk price increase: Opportunity for domestic milk

(Baonghean.vn) - Although prices also increased, if domestic milk only increased by about 5%, most foreign milk products increased by 10-18%. This is considered the highest increase ever. Typically, Ensure Gold milk box 900g price 472,000 VND in October "jumped" to 558,000 VND/box in early December 2011. Then, many other milk brands such as Mead Johnson, XO, Milex... also adjusted the price up from 10-15%. Currently, Enfa Mama box 900g is priced at 313,000 VND/box, Enfalac tin box 900g is priced at 396,000 VND/box, Enfa Grow box 900g is priced at 384,000 VND/box...

Since the beginning of 2011, Abbott, Mead Johnson... milk companies have adjusted their selling prices three times. It is worth mentioning that representatives of the above milk companies have explained to the Price Management Department (Ministry of Finance) that the reason for the price increase is import tax, imported raw materials, and increased input costs. Ms. Tran Khanh Hong - owner of a store specializing in selling candy and milk at Hung Dung market (Vinh city) said: The price increase of milk companies is very unreasonable, it needs to be inspected and controlled by management agencies. In fact, every time milk companies announce a price increase, we hear management agencies say they will inspect and control, but it is still the same. Many agents receive great profits because they are able to stock up on goods when they know about the price increase in advance."

As soon as the sales staff informed her of the milk price increase, Ms. Nguyen Thi Tu - owner of a grocery store on Nguyen Thai Hoc Street (Vinh City) - said: "If before our store sold 10 cartons of foreign milk per day, now it is only about 3 cartons. Instead, domestic milk brands such as Vinamilk's Dielac, NutiIQ of Nutifood, DutchLady, Nuvita... are selling very well. Normally, milk companies give agents a 10% discount on the selling price, however, to keep customers, I have to share the discount to lower the cost because the milk price has increased too much, making it very difficult to sell."

While imported milk prices have been adjusted to increase continuously, the prices of domestically produced milk of some companies have remained the same since mid-year. According to Mr. Pham Quang Thanh, a market development officer of Vinamilk, "If you pay attention to the ingredients listed on the product packaging, customers can see that many foreign and domestic milk products have similar quality, all use the same source of raw materials, and are required to apply international ISO-9001 quality standards and HACCP food safety and hygiene standards... However, foreign milk has to bear many additional costs such as transportation fees, import tax on finished products; advertising, marketing, promotion fees... so the price difference is quite high compared to domestic milk. For the same 900g box, domestic milk costs about 165,000-280,000 VND, while many foreign milk products can be twice as expensive.

According to nutrition experts, consumers should not have the notion that the more expensive the milk, the better, but should consider whether the milk is suitable for each person's absorption capacity or not. Milk is an important source of nutrition but is not the most optimal for comprehensive physical and mental development. And given the current unstable situation of the milk market, strengthening inspection, combating unfair competition, combating commercial fraud as well as providing full information on milk quality to protect the legitimate rights of consumers is an urgent requirement.

Ngoc Anh