This was the second time the Vietnamese leader attended a discussionwith leading Japanese enterprises including Tokyo-Mitsubishi, Canon,Sumitomo, Hitachi, and Bridgestone this time around. The first functiontook place in late 2013 with executives from 11 Japanese firms.
PM Nguyen Tan Dung, who is in Japan to attend the 7th Mekong-JapanSummit, said Vietnam is entering a new stage of development with a morestable macro-economy, faster growth and better controlled inflation.Gross domestic product (GDP) grew by 6.28 percent in the first sixmonths of 2015 and could expand by 6.5 percent this year – the fastestpace since 2011.
Vietnam is focusing on completingmarket mechanisms and developing human resources and infrastructure. Itis also joining efforts with other members of the Association ofSoutheast Asian Nations (ASEAN) to build an ASEAN Economic Communitywith a population of 625 million and a GDP of 2.5 trillion USD by theend of this year.
He continued to say that Vietnamis working with partner countries, including the US and Japan, toexpeditiously conclude negotiations on the Trans-Pacific Partnershipagreement to sign the pact as soon as possible. Its participation infree trade agreements is opening more commercial opportunities with 55countries and partners - including 15 members of the G20.
The leader also highlighted the sound development of the strategicpartnership between his country and Japan, who has continually been thetop donor of official development assistance (ODA) to Vietnam over thepast two decades.
Japan is currently Vietnam’sthird largest trade partner with trade expected to near 30 billion USDthis year and its biggest investor with 38 billion USD to be poured intoVietnam in 2015.
He added that Vietnam isundertaking measures to remove existing business obstacles such asreforming administrative procedures relating to taxes, customs,construction and land.
It is striving to bring itsbusiness environment criteria on par with the ASEAN-4 group (Singapore,Malaysia, the Philippines and Thailand) in 2016. A number of importantlaws have been amended and enforced such as the laws on investment,enterprises, housing and real estate business, he said, adding that theGovernment has also issued a decree on public-private partnership and isdesigning legal documents to assist small- and medium-sized enterprisesand support industries.
Such moves illustrateVietnam’s strong commitment to aligning its investment and businessclimate with global criteria and free trade agreement terms, PM NguyenTan Dung noted.
At the discussion, the PM andVietnamese ministers exchanged opinions and responded to questions andproposals raised by Japanese entrepreneurs, especially on the automobileindustry, and energy, infrastructure, pharmaceuticals and ODAprojects.
The Japanese side valued the VietnameseGovernment’s efforts to improve its business environment and voicedtheir interest in extending their operations in Vietnam.
Also on July 3, PM Nguyen Tan Dung met with executives from Nikkei, Mitsui Sumitomo, and Mitsubishi.-VNA