Prime Minister: 'Vietnam is fertile enough to nurture leading Asian businesses'

Prime Minister: Vietnam is completely fertile enough to nurture leading Asian businesses.

During his visit to the Kingdom of the Netherlands, on the afternoon of July 10 in The Hague, Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc and Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Social Policy and Employment of the Netherlands Lodewijck Asscher attended the Vietnam - Netherlands Business Forum, with the participation of about 300 Dutch enterprises and 150 Vietnamese enterprises. This event was organized by the Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry in coordination with the Confederation of Dutch Industry and Employers.

Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc spoke and directly dialogued with Dutch businesses.

In his speech at the Forum, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Social Policy and Employment of the Netherlands Lodewijck Asscher assessed that Vietnam is a very attractive market for Dutch businesses.

Speaking at the Forum, Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc said that the trade cooperation between the two countries began in the 17th century, when the Dutch East India Company's merchant fleets docked at the port, traded and established a branch in Hoi An, Quang Nam. Hoi An is now a UNESCO World Cultural Heritage site. Dutch merchants were also the first Western merchants to open a trading post in Pho Hien, Hung Yen province, northern Vietnam.

With such a history, the Prime Minister said it is not surprising that there are many famous Dutch names in Vietnam today. These are not only popular Dutch brands in Vietnam but also the most comprehensively successful FDI enterprises in Vietnam. The Netherlands is also one of Vietnam's leading trade partners and export markets in Europe. Currently, two-way trade turnover has reached over 7 billion USD. As of March 2017, Dutch investment in Vietnam reached 7.65 billion USD, ranking first among EU countries investing in Vietnam, accounting for 35.5% of the region's total investment capital in Vietnam.

Informing investors that Vietnam's business environment is fertile enough to nurture leading Asian enterprises, the Prime Minister said that Vietnam is highly evaluated and ranked by international organizations in terms of its business investment environment. Many Vietnamese enterprises are among the top 1,000 enterprises in Asia. The Vietnamese stock market is currently over 100 billion USD in size and many large-scale enterprises will soon be listed.

The Prime Minister also pointed out the advantages for Dutch investors when investing in Vietnam, which is not only the 100 million-people market of Vietnam but also from Vietnam they can enter the ASEAN market and southern China.

Highlighting Vietnam’s advantages, Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc said that Vietnam has strengths in agricultural development, especially in high-quality aquaculture. With tropical specialty fruits, food crops and medicinal herbs, Vietnam encourages Dutch businesses to increase investment, improve deep processing capacity, and position Vietnam higher in the global value chain.

Faced with the challenges of climate change, the Prime Minister emphasized that Vietnam hopes the Dutch private sector will pay attention to investing and supporting Vietnam in addressing these challenges. This is also a great opportunity for Dutch businesses, including small and medium-sized enterprises.

Immediately after his speech, Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc witnessed the exchange ceremony of 9 cooperation agreements between businesses of the two countries with a total capital of about 700 million USD.

The Prime Minister witnessed the signing ceremony of cooperation agreements between a number of businesses of the two countries.

Next, the Prime Minister directly discussed many issues of interest to Dutch enterprises related to the investment environment, challenges in agricultural development in Vietnam, etc. The Prime Minister said that Vietnam is a country with rich potential for agricultural development with agricultural export turnover reaching about 33 billion USD. Vietnam is both oriented towards the domestic market and export strategy. Therefore, Vietnam develops unique and competitive products. Vietnam aims to strongly develop agriculture with good and highly qualified labor.

Prime Minister speaks at the Vietnam-Netherlands Business Forum

With the current product structure of Vietnam, with a Vietnamese market of nearly 100 million people and a large market when Vietnam participates in free trade agreements, Vietnam's export strategy is stronger, increasing by over 12%/year in the coming time./.

According to VOV