Vietnam spent more than 2 billion USD on importing cotton in the first eight months of 2018 – the biggest-ever spending of the garment and textile sector.

Of the total, imports from the US exceeded 1 billion USD, according to the Vietnam Customs.

The increase in spending on cotton imports was attributed to growth in garment and textile exports, as Vietnam depends on nearly 100 percent of imported cotton materials.

Vietnam estimates to use more than 3 billion USD to buy cotton this year, up 700-800 million USD against the previous year.

The country also set a target of earning 34-35 billion USD from exporting garment and textile products.

Last year, the textile and garment industry gained a year-on-year increase of 10.23 percent in the export value of textiles and garment to 31 billion USD, higher than its target set at the beginning of the year at 30 billion USD.-VNA