Concern about losing its position in the export market
China is the main market for Vietnamese fresh fruit, including durian. Since Vietnam and China signed the Protocol on plant quarantine to export durian to China, all businesses, cooperatives, and people have hoped that export activities will take place smoothly, bringing profits to businesses, cooperatives, and people.
However, since the end of 2024, China has discovered that Vietnamese and Thai durian are both contaminated with cadmium, requiring 100% of shipments to have cadmium and yellow O test certificates to be cleared through customs. If residues are detected, the packing house and growing area codes will be suspended. This has severely affected durian exports.
In 2024, Vietnam's durian exports reached a record of 3.2 billion USD. However, in the first 4 months of 2025, Vietnam's durian export turnover only reached about 130 million USD, with an estimated export output of 35,000 tons (about 20% of the plan), while in the same period last year it was more than 500 million USD.
According to Ministry of Agriculture and Environment, emergence of procedures to meet new requirements on food safety control in China and current peak harvest season in other countries are the main reasons for the price drop.
Due to difficulties in exporting goods, domestic durian prices have also dropped sharply. On May 18, durian prices at many gardens increased slightly, but only half compared to the same period last year. According to reflection, currently, traders come to the garden to buy bulk goods for only about 40,000 - 50,000 VND/kg depending on the type and quality, while in the same period last year it was 70,000 - 80,000 VND/kg.
Talking to reporters of Cong Thuong Newspaper, Mr. Vu Duc Con - Chairman of Dak Lak Province Durian Association - said that up to now, number of codes for growing areas and packaging facilities of Vietnamese agricultural industry in general such as jackfruit and durian have been continuously revoked by China. For durian products, number of revoked codes has reached about 55 growing area codes and 61 packaging facility codes. At the same time, since September 2023, Plant Protection Department has continuously introduced new growing areas and packaging facilities to China and they have not been approved. Total durian area in the country is 150,000 hectares, but the area with a code is about 20%, not commensurate with Vietnam's actual export capacity.
Eastern and Central Highlands crop season has a large output, total harvested area of the two Eastern and Central Highlands seasons is estimated at about 45,000 hectares, equivalent to more than 500,000 tonnes of durian in 2025. The Central Highlands is also a competitive advantage for Vietnam compared to Thailand, Malaysia, and Indonesia, because the Central Highlands will harvest durian from August to November every year, which is the only season in the world with durian.
However, the fact that each place has a different price and the time to return the results for yellow O is 4 days, cadmium is 2 days... is considered inappropriate. There has been a situation where import customers choose the supply source from Thailand because of the cost advantage and testing time.
Speaking to reporters from Industry and Trade Newspaper, Mr. Vo Tan Loi - Chairman of Durian Association of Tien Giang Province, in October and November 2024, each truck only cost about 20 - 30 million VND for testing. But now, if testing for both yellow O and cadmium indicators, the cost is up to 50 - 60 million VND/truck. This cost is dozens of times higher than in Thailand. Regarding this, according to Mr. Vu Duc Con, currently, China only approves a number of laboratories introduced by Plant Protection Department to test yellow O and cadmium. Therefore, Ministry of Agriculture and Environment is requested to direct laboratories to create favorable conditions for businesses to connect, without information interruptions at stable and reasonable costs, avoiding monopoly profiteering, creating a mechanism of asking - giving, which is unfair to exporting businesses and at the same time continue to negotiate with China to open more laboratories licensed to test so that businesses have more options.
Comprehensive implementation of solutions, maintaining export markets
From now until September, the whole country will have about 1.7 million tons of durian to consume. While Vietnam is still struggling to handle technical warnings, Thailand has quickly responded to the request and received the "green light" from China, rising to the top in durian exports to the billion-people market. In the first 4 months of 2025, Thailand exported up to 71,000 tons, reaching 287 million USD, double the output and turnover of Vietnam.
Mr. Dang Phuc Nguyen - General Secretary of Vietnam Fruit and Vegetable Association - affirmed to reporters of the Industry and Trade Newspaper that Thailand has very strict control from the garden to the warehouse, so China is assured and has opened the green channel. As for Vietnam, just tracing to the packing facility is not enough. The durian season in Eastern Vietnam is about to start, followed by the Central Highlands. If we do not change, we will lose more market share to Thailand.
Notably, General Administration of Customs of China began allowing the transportation of fresh durian from Cambodia in compliance with food safety laws in late April. Thus, Cambodia has become the latest Southeast Asian country to participate in the "lucrative" durian market in China. Indonesia is also preparing to start exporting durian to China, and Lao producers are also looking for opportunities to penetrate Chinese market.
Thailand has long dominated the Chinese market, supplying 57% of the total $6.99 billion worth of durian imported into the country last year. Vietnam was the second largest supplier with a 38% market share, while the Philippines and Malaysia sold a combined $38.2 million (according to China Customs).
With an export turnover of $3.2 billion in 2024, durian is a potential industry, bringing high value and requiring attention and systematic investment from the construction and planning of raw material areas, packaging factories that meet the food safety conditions of the importing country and transparent export processes, with traceability of product origin.
Ministry of Agriculture and Environment said that control solutions from the growing area to shorten processing time at the border gate have been proposed. In addition, the policy of not depending on one market is also of interest as Vietnam is currently expanding exports to 15 countries with demand for both fresh and frozen durian.
Central Highlands is currently not contaminated with cadmium - this is a huge advantage. While waiting for the authorities to find a solution to maintain the market for the Dak Lak durian industry, Mr. Vu Duc Con said that the Association has "joined hands" with the Western Highlands Agricultural and Forestry Science Institute (WASI) to build a long-term cooperation program.
In immediate future, sampling will be organized to assess situation of cadmium and yellow O contamination across the province, as well as to find out origin and cause of residue of banned substances on the product to have appropriate solutions. In the long term, a set of basic standards for Dak Lak will be developed to proactively control quality of durian products. Along with that, organization controls and guides growing areas and packaging facilities to perform specific tasks...

Source: Vitic/ congthuong.vn