(VOVworld) - Vietnam and the Republic of Korea (RoK) have reiterated their determination to wrap up negotiation on a bilateral free trade agreement (FTA) by the end of this year, during the fifth round of talks which took place in Seoul from May 20-23.

Processing seafood for exports (Photo: case.vn)

The fifth round has seen progress made in the fields of tariff, rule of origin, services, investment, legal issue and institutions, trade defence, sanitary and phytosanitory measures, technical barriers to trade agreement and economic cooperation. Vietnam asked the RoK to give appropriate consideration to Vietnam’s key export products such as seafood and farm produce while promising to pay attention to the interests of Korean exporters with better conditions compared to the ASEAN-RoK Free Trade Agreement. The six round of negotiation will be held in mid July in Vietnam.