Vietnam PM pledges to safeguard Japanese investors’ interests
Vietnam PM pledges to safeguard Japanese investors’ interests
The Vietnamese Government is committed to safeguarding the rights and interests of Japanese companies doing business in the country, Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc told a meeting in Tokyo on June 28 with the leaders of nearly 30 Japanese technology firms.
The Vietnamese leader started his visit to Japan one day earlier to attend the 2019 G20 Osaka summit, the 14th meeting of the Group of Twenty, at the invitation of his Japanese counterpart Shinzo Abe, reported the Vietnam News Agency.
He told the participants that Vietnam has maintained social stability and strong economic growth over the past few years, allowing foreign investors to feel secure in doing business in the country.
Vietnam is also integrating deeply into the world economy, as reflected through its ties with 220 nations and territories. It is set to sign a free trade agreement with the European Union this Sunday. It has also signed trade pacts with 15 nations of the G20.
The country aims to develop an e-Cabinet to serve as the foundation for its digital transformation, according to the PM.
As Japan is a developed country with many major investors in information technology (IT), the Vietnamese Government is encouraging more Japanese firms, including those in this sector, to invest more in Vietnam, he said.
At the meeting, most leaders of Japanese technology firms, such as Hitachi, Toshiba, Hanwa, Daikin, Fujitsu, Kajima and Kansai Economy, which have invested in Vietnam for a long time, expressed hope that they will be able to expand their investments in the country.
They suggested Vietnam pay further attention to human resource development to better serve socioeconomic development in the years ahead.
They asked the Government to speed up the investment approval process and adopt a more flexible approach to approving business plans, particularly in the IT sector, since the business environment in this field changes rapidly.
In response, PM Phuc said that the country regards workforce training, especially in the IT sector, as an important task and is striving to have more than one million high-quality workers in the sector in the 2020-2025 period.
He called for Japanese universities, research institutes and IT firms to engage actively in IT manpower training in Vietnam.
On the same day, Phuc met with Koichi Miyata, chairman of the Board of Directors of Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation (SMBC), which is also a major Japanese investor in the finance and banking sector in Vietnam.
Speaking highly of the corporation’s investment in Vietnam, he expressed his belief that SMBC can help boost the economic, trade and financial cooperation between the two countries.
There are currently 130 nations and territories investing in Vietnam with a total investment of US$350 billion, of which over US$200 billion has been disbursed. Japan is one of Vietnam’s largest investors, at nearly US$60 billion.
