Vietnam - Furhlander to build a USD 25 million wind turbine factory in central Vietnam

While Vietnam said its exports to Germany fell to USD 900 million in the first half of the year, a Germany company, Furhlander, said it got a deal to build a USD 25 million wind turbine factory in central Vietnam to supply renewable energy projects, showing the growing relationship in European Union business with that Southeast Asian country.

The new manufacturing plant, which was announced last week, will be located in the coastal province of Binh Dinh and will represent Vietnam’s first wind turbine factory.

But Nguyen Thanh Bien, deputy minister of trade and industry, blamed the drop in exports on the overall decline in demand in Germany’s recessionary economy. Germany accounts for 27 per cent of Vietnam’s trade with the European Union, making it the country’s biggest trading partner in the EU. Last year bilateral trade between Vietnam and Germany reached USD 3.5 billion. That looks set to fall this year, as bilateral trade reached just USD 1.5 billion in the first six months of 2009.

Imports of garments and textiles worth USD 190 million topped the list of German imports, followed by footwear, coffee and seafood. Vietnam imports machinery and equipment, pharmaceuticals, cars and chemicals from Germany. Officials from Vietnam’s Ministry of Trade and Industry met with business executives to seek ways to boost exports in the remaining months of the year, the Viet Nam News reported.

At the meeting, Bien said commodities exports had fallen sharply in August after a slight rise the previous month. Manufactured exports also fell slightly. Vietnam’s government set a national target of 63 billion dollars in exports this year, an increase of three percent over the previous year. But exports have reached just 37 billion dollars through August, a 14 percent decline.
At the meeting, Le Van Dao, head of Vietnam’ garments and textiles association, said that to meet the target, his sector would need exports of USD 3.6 billion from now through December. Dao said this was unlikely, as exports usually fall in the last months of the year.

Furhlander said the new wind turbine factory will initially produce 1.5MW turbines, before adding 2.5MW models to the production line. Fuhrländer, which has wind turbine plants in Germany, the US and Brazil, did not provide an estimated completion date for the Vietnam facility. The German company has teamed up with Vietnam Windpower Joint Stock Co to deliver the project. While the backers of the local company have not been identified, Vietnamese media reported last year that renewable energy research firm Thien Nang, construction equipment makers Lilama Corp and Coma, and lender Techcombank were in talks with Fuhrländer for a wind turbine factory, according to a report in businessGreen.

Fuhrländer supplied the five turbines for Vietnam’s first wind farm, located in the central province of Binh Thuan, although all the equipment for the USD 55 million project was sourced from Germany. The wind farm is expected be connected to the national grid within the next few weeks, with an initial installed capacity of 7.5MW. An additional 15 turbines are to be erected over the next few years to bring the total capacity to 30MW. Germany is fostering relations with Vietnam in hopes of developing partnerships for wind power projects in the country. Last month, state-backed development agency German Organisation for Technical Cooperation provided a USD 1.4 million grant to Vietnam aimed at developing the nation’s wind power industry.

For more information please contact Trevor Sievert at ts@windfair.net