In Vietnam, there is no specific term that is translatable either literally or in the EU legal sense as “commercial agent”.
The Vietnamese prefer “Intermediary Commercial Activities” when it comes to the activity of agency.
The Vietnamese legislator put its eyes on such intermediary commercial activities indeed rather late. In the beginning, with a centrally planned economy, commercial activities were mainly performed by state-owned enterprises and conducted by direct transactions, hence the intermediary’s role was not being paid the attention that it deserves in a market economy. However, during and after the Đổi Mới-based reforms of 1986, agency, brokerage, and authorised dealers have started to be operated by state-owned organisations with the purpose of achieving the economic and social goals for the State, i.e. not exactly for the goal of conducting the business of those organisations themselves. In the activities of sale and purchase of export and import goods by authorised dealers, due to the implementation of the State monopoly policy on foreign trade, only the state-owned enterprises were allowed to be the entrusting / entrusted subjects. Such activities were carried out on the basis of an annual plan proposed by the President of the local People's Committee and accepted by the Ministry of Foreign Trade (Circular No. 03-BNgT / XNK dated 11 January 1984 of the Ministry of Foreign Trade regulates the mandate of import and export of goods).
For the activities of commercial agency, in the first places, a transition from Communism to private-owned businesses in the Southern provinces of Vietnam was introduced by giving the right to private business owners to sell the goods on the behalf of the State (Decision no. 100/CP dated 12 April 1977) and that very right belonged to state-owned enterprises too. After Đổi Mới, the activities of commercial intermediaries have been developed into four categories which are Representative of Business Entities, Commercial Brokerage, Sale and Purchase of Goods by Authorised Dealers and Commercial Agency, this subdivision being primarily of historical nature.
Agency Agreements are regulated partly by the Law on Commerce 2005 no. 36/2005/QH11 and for certain aspects by the Civil Code 2015.