Directorof the Ho Chi Minh City’s Investment and Trade Promotion Centre (ITPC)Pho Nam Phuong was quoted as saying recent surveys in Myanmar show thatthe country is an attractive, potential market for Vietnamese goods, asit imports 90 percent of its industrial and consumer goods. In addition,many Myanmar companies want to cooperate with Vietnamese counterparts.
Accordingto the statistics, Vietnam-Myanmar trade came to 228 million USD in2012 and 300 million USD in 2013. However, Vietnam still lags behindmany countries, including Singapore, China, Indonesia, Japan, the US,Thailand and the Republic of Korea in terms of goods exports to Myanmar.
As of the end of 2013, there were 45 Vietnamese businesseslicensed to operate in Myanmar, while 19 others waiting to be licensed.Seven Vietnamese projects with a total registered capital of more than600 million USD were licensed to invest in Myanmar. Of these, notableprojects included the Hoang Anh Gia Lai hotel, trade centre and officeand apartment building complex, Simco Song Da Corporation’s marblemining project and the PetroVietnam Exploration Production Corporation(PVEP)’s oil and gas exploration joint venture project.
Phuongsaid that Vietnamese businesses can export to Myanmar cattle, poultryand seafood disease prevention drugs and seafood, farm produce andforest product processing and preservation equipment and technology.They can strengthen investment cooperation with Myanmar partners inagricultural, forestry and fishery technology, farm development, healthand education.
According to the newspaper, many Vietnamesebusinesses have said that Myanmar is a potential market and they willimprove competitiveness through quality improvement.
Vietnamtargets to increase its trade with Myanmar to 600 million USD in 2015and its direct investment in the country to the 2 billion USD level.-VNA