A number of Vietnamese fashion designers has left a deep impression on international clients and received praise from foreign media for their creativity, such as Nguyen Cong Tri, Phuong My and Thuy Nguyen. They were invited to participate in many prestigious international fashion weeks.
In addition, the Vietnam International Fashion Week which is launched for the first time in 2014, has also contributed to putting Vietnam on the international fashion map during the past ten seasons, she added.
With a large number of population, Vietnam not only represents a huge potential market for the fashion industry, but also other economic sectors. Besides, Vietnam is evolving as a sourcing destination for many global clothing retailers with the young and abundant workforce.
The other advantages are the infrastructures and outsourcing firms that are available, the changeable and easily-adaptable taste in fashion of Vietnamese people, the willingness to open to new things, the shift in the Vietnamese consumer's purchasing behavior towards buying domestically-produced goods, Mrs. Trang stressed.
However, the country’s fashion industry is still facing with challenges, such as the lack of appropriate investment from the State in fashion and designing related activities; the shortage in developing and promoting traditional craft villages, providing training programs for young talents, offering a combination among suppliers of raw materials, outsourcing providers, designers and advertsing agencies; and the low concentration of the development of internal potentials, she noted.
According to CAFD’s president, the Council of ASEAN Fashion Designers has working sessions on the establishing of the Vietnamese Fashion Assocation that will be a representative organization for the sector’s insiders with the Ministry of Industry and Trade. The Government should aslo pay more attention to the Vietnamese fashion industry to bring it into the world.
Regarding to responsibilities after being promoted to new role, Mrs. Trang said that she will focus on seeking individuals qualified to become the Council’s members in every ASEAN nation. They will help the Council discover outstanding designers in each country and apply them to become members of the association. The CAFD will help these nominees to promote their designs to customers in the region and even world-wide by using the AFAP (Asean Fabulous) app. Designers will not pay any fees to become the official members of CAFD. Vietnam will be the first country to introduce new collections on AFAP App.
The Council of ASEAN Fashion Designers (CAFD) is an independent non-profit organization to facilitate ASEAN fashion to remain relevant and designers to thrive in the digital economy. CAFD is the first ever fashion organization to be accredited by the ASEAN Secretariat. . This is a supervising council to promote high quality ASEAN fashion, apparel and ASEAN atelier industry moving forward. CAFD is created to impact the world and to empower its members in taking their vision and ideas, and making them a commercial reality.
