China-Vietnam Investment Operation Forum was held in Nanning on Oct 28. Officials came to take part in the Expo presented and delivered speeches at the Forum.

Nearly 450 representatives from Chinese and Vietnamese political circle and enterprises were present at the Forum. A briefing was made on the situation of two-way investment operation, and the attendees jointly discussed the effective way of further expanding China-Vietnam cooperation scale and field, as well as promoting cooperative level.

Vietnamese Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung said that Vietnam welcomed and expected Chinese enterprises to invest and encourage industries there. Each project of the two parties would be granted as the bridge and link of the friendly cooperation between the two countries. Vietnam entered into WTO in 2007. Its stable economic development and sustained improving investment environment would provide a favorable cooperative and investing environment and situation for Chinese enterprises as well as the international. China has become the biggest trade partner of Vietnam with increasing trade value in recent years. From Jan to Sep 2007, 190 million USD had been invested in Vietnam by Chinese enterprises. China-Vietnam economic and trade relationship was expected to obtain sustained development and a new level under their joint effort.

China’s Vice Minister of Commerce Gao Hucheng said that China-Vietnam economic and trade cooperation had stepped into an all-round, multi-field, and fast developing phase. China had become Vietnam’s biggest trade partner for 3 years in succession. The trade value between the two nations hit 10 billion USD in advance in 2006. The bilateral trade in Jan-Sep 2007 reached 10.35 billion USD, up by 45% y-o-y, topped the trade of China with other ASEAN members. In recent years, the two nations vigorously carried out cooperation on human resources. Up to now, China had trained 1,357 officials and technique personnel, and the cooperation on big projects in electric power station, light rail, communication, and mining industry achieved good results. China encouraged and supported powerful enterprises to set up trade and economic cooperation zone in Vietnam, so as to further expand investment, improve investing level. In the meantime, more and more Vietnam’s enterprises and products came into China’s market.

Gao said China and Vietnam hold close cooperation under the multilateral frameworks of China-ASEAN FTA, Great Mekong River Sub-regional Economic Cooperation, East Asia Cooperation, and APEC. China-ASEAN FTA development, especially the implementation of Early Harvest Program played a positive role in quickening trade and economic cooperation between the two nations. Both of them gained mutual beneficial and win-win situation, with prosperous import and export. Trade under the Early Harvest Program in 2006 hit 400 million USD, up by 45%, out of which China’s import from Vietnam was 240 million USD, up by 72%. Since Vietnam became WTO member this year, the two nations were expected to close cooperation and support each other under the multilateral framework of WTO.

Gao said China was willingly to strive jointly with Vietnam for the enterprises in fields like creating favorable environment and providing fine service, promoting further cooperation in infrastructure construction, resource exploration, processing trade, energy resources, electric power, manufacture and human resource. The economic and trade cooperation would be developed through exchanging needs and complementing each other with advantages, as well as the mutual benefit and win-win situation.