Vietnamese Associations Advocate for Material Hub to Boost Fashion Industry

The Leather, Footwear and Handbag Association of Vietnam (Lefaso) has put on the table the need to create a fashion materials innovation and commercialization center to strengthen the domestic supply chain and improve the competitiveness of the country’s leather, footwear and miscellaneous textile industries.

As advanced by Vietnam News, Lefaso believes that the leather and footwear sector is heavily dependent on importing materials from other countries, so developing the local supply of raw materials becomes key to the sector’s long-term growth.

The plan is to accompany the 40-hectare development center with “innovative policies and strong government support”. Vietnam looks to China for inspiration, where “similar models have worked successfully”. The aim of the center would be to diversify material sources and drive innovation in design and business models to optimize the supply chain.

The hub, moreover, would not only cater to domestic demand, but could be used to supply materials to neighboring countries, such as Indonesia, Cambodia and Bangladesh.

Vietnam aims to innovate design and business models to optimize its own supply chain

Vietnamese companies are essential producers for the global fashion business, especially in the footwear segment. Highly dependent on China, Vietnamese companies have been looking to other countries for months to diversify their suppliers in the face of the open trade war between the Asian country and the United States.

In fact, the situation in China, as well as the uprisings in Bangladesh last year, have been favoring Vietnam for months. At the end of 2024, it recorded an increase of 7.09% in its Gross Domestic Product (GDP) to $47.3 billion, above national estimates.

Vietnam’s economy has emerged as the fastest growing in the Southeast Asian region, ahead of giants such as Indonesia and Thailand. The country’s new target for 2025 is for similar growth of between 6.5% and 7%, although the country’s Prime Minister, Pham Minh Chinh Chinh, already predicted a forecast of up to 8% at the end of the year.