Vietnam and Japan agreed to build the Vietnam – Japan Technology Innovation Cooperation Partnership Initiative, promote cooperation to improve production and management capacity in order to develop supporting industries (SI) of Vietnam in several phases, firstly is electricity – electronics, automobiles and textiles.
Minister of Industry and Trade Nguyen Hong Dien has just had a meeting with Mr. Yamada Taikio, Japanese Ambassador in Vietnam to discuss measures for further strengthening in the Vietnam – Japan cooperation relationship in term of trade, industry and energy.
The Minister thanked Japan Government for donating 2 million doses of Astra Zeneca vaccine and will continue to give 1 million doses more on 16/7/2021. Mr. Dien also suggested the Ambassador to keep supporting Vietnam in access on large-scale Covid-19 vaccination, especially for employees, workers at factories, industrial parks and retail systems of Japan FDI enterprises.
Regarding cooperation in industrial field, both sides agreed to push investment attraction of Japan enterprises into Vietnam, further tighten the production supply chain between the 2 countries. Also, they wish to strengthen investment cooperation, technology transfer, capacity building and training for Vietnam’s fundamental industries such as chemicals, materials, mechanical engineering and SI, etc. Especially the 2 parties agreed to build Vietnam – Japan Technology Innovation Cooperation Partnership Initiative, promote cooperation to improve production and management capability for development of Vietnam’s supporting industries in individual phases, firstly in the fields of electricity – electronics, automobiles, and textiles. In term of trade, relationship between the 2 countries have made strong progress in both quantity and quality in recent years. The structure of import and export products show clear supplementation without direct competitiveness that gives opportunities and room for development.
Minister Nguyen Hong Dien and the Ambassador both emphasized the important role of effective implementation of bilateral and multilateral free trade agreements for bilateral trade such as Vietnam – Japan Economic Partnership Agreement, Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership, and Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership. In the context of Covid-19 complicated development, in order to strengthen and diversify the supply chain of agricultural products, the Minister suggested that Japan side to strengthen the opening of agricultural market and support to bring Vietnam agricultural products into the distribution system in Japan.
Vietnam’s import and export turnover with Japan in 2020 reached US$ 39.6 billion, accounting for 7.26% of Vietnam’s total import and export turnover. In the first 5 months of 2021, the figure reached US$ 17.1 billion, increased 9.7% over the same period in 2020. Of which, Vietnam’s exports to Japan reached US$ 8,3 billion, increased 5.6% and Vietnam’s imports from Japan reached US$ 8.8 billion, increased 13.7%. According to statistics of Foreign Investment Department (Ministry of Planning and Investment), accumulating projects valid until 20/6/2021, Japan is the 2nd largest foreign investor out of 140 countries and territories investing in Vietnam, i.e. 4,716 projects with total registered investment capital of US$ 63.1 billion, accounting for 15.8% of total investment capital.
