Brazilian leather makers target Vietnam trade fair to boost exports

Five Brazilian leather manufacturers will head to Shoes & Leather Vietnam from July 8 to 10, when the 26th International Shoes & Leather Exhibition - Vietnam opens at the Saigon Exhibition & Convention Center in Ho Chi Minh City. Cortume Krumenauer, Courovale, Euro-América, JBS Couros and Minuano will attend with support from Brazilian Leather, the export promotion program run by CICB and ApexBrasil.

The timing is deliberate. Vietnam is now one of the most important leather manufacturing markets in Asia, and Brazilian Leather places it fourth among the largest buyers of Brazilian leather. It is also described as the world’s third-largest importer of leather from any origin and the fourth-largest importer of hides and leather from Brazil, a mix that makes the country a powerful outlet for tanners looking to keep mills full as global sourcing shifts.

Rogério Cunha, CICB’s trade intelligence manager, has pointed to Vietnam’s position as the world’s second-largest exporter of footwear, with 40% of the pairs made for export produced in leather. That production base is exactly why the trade fair matters for Brazilian suppliers: the demand is concentrated not just in finished shoes, but in the steady flow of leather, hides and semi-processed inputs that feed factories in and around Vietnam’s export corridors.

The trade push also lands after a series of policy moves that have made the lane easier to use. In January 2025, Vietnam eliminated the requirement for an International Sanitary Certificate on Brazilian leather exports, and in February 2025 Brazil announced Vietnam’s approval of the certificate for salted bovine hides, materials Brazilian officials described as essential for Vietnam’s footwear, furniture and accessories sectors. Brazil exported more than 557,000 tons of leather in the first 11 months of 2024, up 39.2% from the same stretch in 2023, while Vietnamese footwear and leather exports reached US$27.04 billion in 2024, up 11.45%. Vietnamese footwear exports alone reached US$22.8 billion, up 13%.

For Brazilian Leather, the fair is part of a longer campaign that began in 2000, when the industry exported US$760 million per year. The current push sits inside a wider Brazil-Vietnam relationship too: in March 2025 the two countries signed an Action Plan for 2025-2030, and Brazilian officials said Vietnam had become Brazil’s fourth-largest agricultural export destination by early 2025. For leathermakers, that makes Ho Chi Minh City more than a sales stop. It is where the geography of demand, the paperwork of trade and the scramble for the same hides all meet on the same factory-facing floor.