Completed procedures, Indonesian cars are about to flood into Vietnam

A batch of cars imported from ASEAN has arrived at a port in Vietnam.

According to information from the Ministry of Transport, this agency has officially approved the vehicle type approval certificate (VTA) provided by the Indonesian Government.

The decision was made after the Ministry of Transport worked with representatives of the Indonesian Ministry of Trade in late February 2018.

Thus, with this move, businesses can fully meet the conditions to import completely built-up (CBU) cars from ASEAN countries at a 0% tax rate.

Previously, the Ministry of Transport also approved the VTA provided by the Thai Government. Immediately after completing this procedure, businesses began importing cars from Thailand. Even in early March 2018, the first batch of cars imported by Honda from Thailand arrived at Ho Chi Minh City port.

Compared to Thailand, the number of car models imported from Indonesia by businesses is not much. Most notably is Toyota with the 7-seat multi-purpose vehicle Fortuner.

According to the provisions of Decree 116 of the Government and Circular 03 of the Ministry of Transport guiding the implementation of Decree 116, due to not meeting the procedures, specifically VTA, Toyota Vietnam joint venture has not been able to import and sell the Fortuner model to the market since the beginning of the year.

Before being stopped due to Decree 116, Fortuner was always in the top 5 best-selling car models in the market with monthly sales exceeding 1,000 units. In the first 3 months of 2018, due to stagnant supply, no Fortuner was sold on the market.

After the Ministry of Transport approves the VTA provided by the Indonesian Government, Toyota Vietnam will import Fortuner into the country. It is expected that, to complete the contract and other procedures such as transportation, customs clearance or inspection, the market will begin to welcome the return of Fortuner around the end of May or early June 2018.

Notably, with the 0% import tax rate, the retail price of Fortuner will also be adjusted down. At the same time, due to pent-up demand since the beginning of the year, Fortuner promises to create an explosion of purchasing power in the market.

Along with Fortuner, another model, Wigo, will also be imported by Toyota Vietnam from Indonesia. Wigo will officially help Toyota Vietnam enter the A-class car segment for the first time. Currently, Toyota dealers have accepted orders from consumers for Wigo. The retail price of this small car model is expected by some dealers to range from 350-400 million VND.