The workshop aimed to urge businesses to produce more commodities in serving low-income earners.

According to the Director of the Business Development Institute of the VCCI, Pham Thi Thu Hang, Vietnam has a population of about 85 million, with 80 percent living in rural areas which businesses should tap into.

Ms Hang added that Vietnamese businesses have only paid attention to helping the poor through humanitarian activities rather than considering them as consumers. Also, as almost all Vietnamese businesses are small in size, they are not capable of producing a large volume of commodities for distribution in remote areas or designing appropriate products and services for the poor.

Participants in the workshop remarked that in recent years, several companies had begun supplying products and services to people with low income, including essential goods, computers and insurance services. However, they said, there is still a distribution of low-quality products to this potential market.