Prime Minister: ASEM needs to become a "friendly" bridge between Asia and Europe

Right before the 12th Asia-Europe Meeting (ASEM) Summit, on the morning of October 18 (local time), at the d'Egmont Palace, Brussels, Belgium, Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc and Norwegian Prime Minister Erna Solberg were the two ASEM leaders invited to give keynote speeches at the 16th Asia-Europe Business Forum (AEBF).

With the theme “Connecting – Building a bridge between Asia and Europe”, the Forum was attended by more than 400 leaders of leading corporations and representatives of the business communities of the two continents.

In his welcome speech to the leaders and businesses attending the Forum, the President of the European Business Association highly appreciated the leadership role and attention of ASEM member leaders in promoting connectivity, creating a favorable business environment, and supporting Asian and European businesses to participate more and more effectively in regional and global value chains.

As the first leader to deliver a keynote speech at the Forum, Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc emphasized that the two continents of Asia and Europe continue to be two bright spots of global economic growth and connectivity, sharing a long history of interaction and connection between the two greatest civilizations of humanity.

The Prime Minister welcomed the recently approved European Union (EU) strategy for connecting Europe and Asia, affirming that enhancing connectivity is a focus of discussion at this year's ASEM Summit, with the determination to make connectivity associated with digital connectivity a new direction for ASEM cooperation, creating new momentum to enhance the practicality and role of ASEM in its third decade.

The Prime Minister also said that the two continents' proactive promotion of negotiations and signing of many large-scale FTAs ​​is opening up huge opportunities for connectivity and development.

The Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) of Asia and many FTAs, economic partnership agreements between the EU, Canada, Japan, Australia, New Zealand and some Southeast Asian countries, including Vietnam... promise to create a free and open economic space for businesses on both sides.

The Prime Minister emphasized that ASEM needs to become a "predestined" bridge for the two sides to "encounter each other", promote the connection of the strengths of the two economic blocs, and create a strong impetus for global development.

Emphasizing the important role of enterprises as a driving force for growth and realizing the aspiration for sustainable development and prosperity, the Prime Minister suggested that Asian and European enterprises, with the spirit of innovation, creativity and action, should proactively and actively promote Asia-Europe connectivity to realize the development potential of the two continents.

Stating that point of view, the Prime Minister proposed strengthening the connection between the Government and businesses.

“With the role of development creation, governments create favorable mechanisms and policies, sign international agreements, and pave the way for businesses to orient themselves towards business.Enterprises should link investment projects and business plans with national development directions and plans, actively engage in public-private cooperation in high-quality infrastructure investment, digital connectivity, education, healthcare, energy, agriculture, manufacturing, processing, etc. I propose to organize regular dialogues between leaders of countries and business communities of the two continents of Asia and Europe during the ASEM Summits to discuss in-depth issues of mutual concern, in line with the interests of the two continents," the Prime Minister emphasized.

The Prime Minister also proposed to soon promote the activities of the ASEM Economic Ministers' Meeting channel and dialogue between Economic Ministers and the business communities of the two continents to effectively implement ASEM cooperation and connectivity orientations in the coming time.

The Prime Minister also said that it is necessary to proactively connect businesses with businesses and develop partnerships to implement free trade agreements between Asian and European economies.

On this occasion, the Prime Minister shared with the business community about Vietnam's economic prospects in the face of many uncertain factors in the world economy.

With 16 free trade agreements signed, under negotiation and to be implemented in the coming time, including new generation FTAs ​​such as the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) and the Vietnam - EU Free Trade Agreement (EVFTA), Vietnam will have highly preferential free trade relations with markets of nearly 60 countries and major partners, which is an opportunity to promote connectivity and participate more deeply in the global value chain and supply network.

“It is a great joy that at this November 2018 session, the Vietnamese National Assembly will ratify the CPTPP Agreement, an agreement with high standards and balanced interests, and Vietnam will be one of the first countries to complete the ratification. Joy follows good news, on October 17, the European Commission approved the EVFTA Agreement. This is an important step forward for the two sides to be able to sign it soon in late 2018 and ratify it in the first half of 2019,” the Prime Minister emphasized.

Emphasizing the policy of putting enterprises at the center, the Prime Minister said that Vietnam is making efforts to build an honest, proactive, development-creating Government serving the people and enterprises, creating a favorable investment and business environment, approaching high standards in new-generation Free Trade Agreements, striving to reach the top group in ASEAN and towards the OECD's high standards on the business environment, creating opportunities for enterprises to move up to higher levels of the global value chain.

Because of these advantages, many foreign investors want to continue expanding their operations in Vietnam.

According to a March 2018 survey by Eurocham in Vietnam, 90% of European businesses want to increase investment in Vietnam. With this potential for cooperation, the Prime Minister said that the implementation of the Framework Agreement on Comprehensive Partnership and Cooperation (PCA), the early signing and ratification of the EVFTA will be a breakthrough.

Agreeing with Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc, Ms. Erna Solberg - Prime Minister of Norway said that it is necessary to further promote Asia-Europe cooperation.

“Mr. Prime Minister and ladies and gentlemen, together, Europe and Asia account for 60% of global production capacity and trade. And this has increased dramatically in the last decade. We all know very well that one of the reasons why there is poverty is lack of jobs. Trade creates jobs, and more people have more income. Therefore, it is important that we (Asia and Europe) continue to cooperate in smarter ways in the future for healthy trade. For Norway, cooperation with Asia is natural because 9 out of 10 largest shipping companies are Asian. But in the future, it is necessary to minimize the environmental impact on the oceans, to better respond to climate change. In addition, today only 5% of the food consumed worldwide comes from the sea. Therefore, we cannot achieve the goal of eliminating global hunger. “If we do not increase the contribution of seafood, Vietnamese, Belgians, we all love seafood,” said the Norwegian Prime Minister.

The 16th Asia-Europe Business Forum, together with the 10th Asia-Europe Parliamentary Partnership Conference (September 27-28), the 3rd Asia-Europe Foundation Young Leaders Forum (October 15-19) and the 12th Asia-Europe People's Forum (September 29-October 1) are practical activities towards the 12th ASEM Summit, taking place on October 18 and 19 in Brussels./.