Vietnam's Dong Thap Province, Japan Eye New Cooperation Opportunities

Japanese businesses believe that localities need to invest in facilities and infrastructure to meet the needs of foreign investors, especially the need to soon complete transport infrastructure projects to shorten the distance from Ho Chi Minh City to Dong Thap province.

A conference aimed at promoting investment and trade cooperation between the Mekong Delta province of Dong Thap and Japan was organized on November 29, attracting more than 50 enterprises and investors from both sides, VNA &NDO reported.

Delegates visit the OCOP product booth on the sidelines of the conference. Source: NDO

Addressing the event, Secretary of the Provincial Party Committee Le Quoc Phong said that Japan has signed many bilateral and multilateral free trade agreements (FTAs) with Vietnam, creating important legal frameworks for promoting trade, investment, and business relations between the two countries.

Dong Thap is a locality with strengths in agricultural production. In addition to rice and aquatic products, the province also has many types of fruit trees that can boost exports to Japan such as mango and longan. Key agricultural production areas are associated with places to visit and experience tourism with bold cultural characteristics.

With a fairly large population, more than 1.6 million people, Dong Thap province has an abundant source of young labor, of which more than 40% have been trained and more than 10,000 workers working in the foreign country. Abundant human resources with increasingly better quality are Dong Thap's advantages for businesses investing in the province or recruiting workers to work in Japan.

Within the framework of the program to send workers to work in Japan, from 2014 to October 2023, Dong Thap has sent more than 10,000 workers. In the first 10 months of 2023 alone, the whole province had 1,278 workers working in Japan). In Japan, out of a total of 1,510 workers leaving to work abroad, accounting for nearly 85%.

Over the past years, Dong Thap has boosted collaboration with many Japanese localities, organizations, and individuals, he said.

As the province has always ranked in the top five in the country in terms of the provincial competitiveness index for the past 15 consecutive years, Dong Thap is confident that it is an ideal investment environment for Japanese businesses, he noted

At the conference promoting investment and trade cooperation between the Mekong Delta province of Dong Thap and Japan. Source: NDO

Japanese Consul General in Ho Chi Minh City Masuo Ono said that once Dong Thap's road and waterway transportation system is complete, it will open up opportunities for investment and trade collaboration between the province’s enterprises and Japanese companies in such fields as agricultural processing, logistics, and tourism.

"In the coming time, the province needs to establish a board to receive and process documents to meet the needs of investors and simplify administrative procedures," he proposed.

At the conference, participants were briefed about industrial parks, border gate economic zones, industrial clusters, fields and projects that are calling for investment.

Japanese businesses believe that localities need to solve the problem of high-quality human resources well; invest in facilities and infrastructure to meet the needs of foreign investors, especially need to soon complete transport infrastructure projects to shorten the distance from Ho Chi Minh City to Dong Thap province.

They are also interested and asked about cooperation with the province in developing organic agriculture, especially for mangoes; human resource training for the field of mechanical engineering and agricultural machinery as well as the investment platform for this field locally.

Investment and trade connection activities between Dong Thap businesses and Japanese businesses were also organized within the framework of the event, along with the introduction of local culture, tourism, and cuisine as well as products with demand for export to Japan.

The total trade turnover between Dong Thap and Japan reached USD 18.17 million in 2022 and topped USD 20.5 million in the first eight months of this year. Dong Thap exported seafood, apparel, footwear, shrimp crackers, and products made from rice to Japan while importing textile accessories and animal feed.

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