280 firms to join Vietnam int'l medical, pharmaceutical expo

Some 280 firms from 25 countries and regions are expected to join Vietnam's international medical and pharmaceutical exhibition (Vietnam Medi Pharm Expo) which will be held on Aug. 11-13, said organizers under Vietnam's Ministry of Industry and Trade on Thursday.

These firms come from China, China's Taiwan, Egypt, France, Germany, Hungary, India, Iran, Italy, Japan, Pakistan, Singapore, South Korea, Thailand, the United States, Ukraine, and Vietnam among others.

Some 350 booths will showcase such items as vacuum blood collection tubes, disposable medical products, pharmaceutical packaging and processing products, Vietnam's state-run news agency VNA quoted organizers as saying.

The biannual event is held in Vietnam's southern Ho Chi Minh City in August and in capital Hanoi in December.

Statistics showed that revenue of Vietnam's medical equipment market is estimated to hit some 1.2 billion U.S. dollars in 2016 and 1.8 billion U.S. dollars by 2018.

The market will experience average annual growth of 18-20 percent during 2016-2020 period, reported VNA.

Pham Le Tuan, director of Vietnam's Ministry of Health's Department of Planning and Finance said on VNA that some 90 percent of Vietnamese medical equipments and tools are imported.

Major suppliers, which account for some 55 percent of Vietnam's total imported revenue of these items, include China, Japan, the United States, Germany, and Singapore. Endit