The potential for trade between Vietnam and India is significant and may reach $15 billion this year. One bottleneck, however, is in transport, especially the absence of direct sea routes connecting the two countries. The newly-opened shipping line connecting central Vietnam with India and Bangladesh, operated by the Vietnam Maritime Corporation (VIMC), will resolve this problem.

Vietnam’s dragon fruit exports to India have increased ten-fold over the last five years, from $1 million in 2015 to $10 million in 2020. India has begun growing the fruit itself, however, and Vietnamese enterprises are competing more fiercely with each other in the country, to the detriment of exports.