Vietnam Terms China's Zero-Covid Strategy As 'Overkill', Thousands Of Trucks Stranded After China Shuts Border Over Covid Fears

Vietnam has termed China’s zero-Covid policies as 'over the top' as thousands of container trucks continue to be stranded at the border between two nations for over a month causing disruption to trade supply chain.

Vietnam’s Ministry of Industry and Trade has requested China's Guangxi region to reopen its border gates with Vietnam and extend customs clearance hours to ease the container congestion.

The trade ministry said that measures by China has greatly disrupted the supply chain, negatively impacted the development of bilateral trade and caused great losses to businesses and people on both sides.

The trade ministry also proposed that Guangxi recruits more drivers and workers on Chinese side to deal with the staff shortage. It also suggested that fully vaccinated Vietnamese be sent across the border to work.

China has tightened its pandemic preventive measure as part of its zero-Covid approach including shutting the border and suspending the imports of certain fruits.

On Dec 29, China announced that it has imposed a four-week ban on dragon fruit imports through a major Vietnamese border gate after detecting Covid-19 in some previous shipments. The ban applies to four varieties of dragon fruit shipped from the central province of Binh Thuan and the southern province of Long An.

A sample taken from the outer packaging of imported dragon fruits on Thursday tested weak positive for COVID-19 in Taizhou, East China's Zhejiang Province, during a regular nucleic acid check, after similar cases were found in several other Chinese cities.