Attending the conference including Standing Deputy Chairman of HCMC People’s Committee Le Thanh Liem, Governor of Hyogo Prefecture Ido Toshizo, representaives of Consulate General of Japan in HCMC, representatives of HCMC’s departments and agencies, represenatives of 15 Japanese enterprises including those investing in HCMC together with more than 100 Vietnamese enterprises.

Speaking at the conference, Mr. Liem said the city is implementing smart city development projects and 7 breakthrough programs in an effort to build HCMC into a modern-civilized-sentimental city with better living quality. He said that the city welcomes foreign investors, including Japanese ones, to invest in fields such as industrial manufacturing, hi-tech, sea port services, hi-tech agricultural development, human resource, science and technology. These fields are of Hyogo Prefeture’s strengths.

He expressed his belief that based on the city’s market scale, growth rate, political-social stability, reasonable labor cost, etc. the potential for cooperation between HCMC and Hyogo is huge. Mr. Liem expressed his hope that enterprises of Hyogo Prefencture will further strengthen with HCMC in the coming time. It is the city’s committment to create favorable conditions and to support Japanese enterprises in general and those of Hyogo in particular to maintain stable, long-term and effective business activities in HCMC.

Mr. Liem also expects that Hyogo will welcome enterprises of HCMC to study business and investment environment to further promote economic cooperation and to bring prospertity to business community and people of both sides.

For his part, Mr. Ido Toshizo commented that the 21st century is considered as “Time for Asia”, especially Southeast Asia region that is now booming, saying that Vietnam has an abundant human resource, political stability, the country is now drawing special attention of international investors. There are now over 1,800 Japanese enterprises doing business in Vietnam.
Japan’s population is set to plummet in the coming time. Therefore, the local demand is expected to have bad impacts on mid and long-term economic growth. However, according to Mr. Ido Toshizo, a decline in population will not lead to economic crisis in Japan. By connecting Japan with other countries with fast growing economies like Vietnam will help boost the growth of the region.

On the other side, attraction of Vietnamese people coming to Japan as tourists or businessmen will help facilitate people to peole exchange and bring economic efficiency. Kobe City, located in Hyogo Prefecture, has an abundant resource of tourism development night scenery, world heritage Himeji Castle, hot springs, etc. Moreover, the next coming years will see world-class sports events organized in Japan like Rugby World Cup; Olympic, Paralympic Tokyo 2020, World Master Games 2021 Kansai. At the same time, Vietnam has now more than 15,000 people living in Hyogo, 30% of number of students in Hyogo come from Vietnam.

Through this conference, Mr. Ido Toshizo expects that Vietnamse enterprises will invest in Hyogo. He said that Vietnamese students after graduated will have opportunities to show their capability in Hyogo based enterprises. He affirmed that the authority of Hyogo Prefecture will make efforts to promtoe exchange activities between both sides’ business community.

At the conference, Department of Planning and Investment of HCMC has provided the updates of economic development situation and policies of the city; representaitve of Sumitomo Mitsui Bank-HCMC branch has presented the Japan’s economic prospects. Representatives of some enteprises linke Kobelco Eco-Solutions Vietnam, Iwasaki Electric Mfg Vietnam, Indochina Corp, etc. have exchanged their experience in investment, business and specfified their cooperation potential.

From 1998 till now, Japan has 1,240 investment projects in HCMC worth US$ 4 billion, ranked 5/100 countries and territories investing in the city. Almost Japanese invested projects focus on fields of processing industries, manufacturing (62%), trade – serve (15%), real estate (6,37%). Hyogo Prefecture has 34 investment projects in HCMC worth US$ 22 million focusing on fields science, technology, logistic, trade, service.

Trade value between HCMC with localities of Japan in 2017 reached US$ 5 billion. Japan imports sea food products, textile & garment, footwear, processed food, ect. and exports to HCMC some major products like machinery, equiepment, spare-parts, electronics equipment, etc. The structure of import-export activities between HCMC and Japan is suplementary and non-competitive so the potential of trade growth is very big.

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