HÀ NỘI — Prime Minister Phạm Minh Chính and Founder and Executive Chairman of the World Economic Forum (WEF) Prof. Klaus Schwab co-chaired a country strategy dialogue on Viet Nam on Friday (October 29).
The event, held in both online and in-person forms, was themed "Public-private partnership: The key driver for comprehensive recovery and sustainable, resilient and innovative growth".
This is the first time that such a national strategic dialogue has taken place between Việt Nam and the WEF. It is also an opportunity for the WEF and foreign investors to directly discuss with the Prime Minister about economic goals and the socio-economic development potential of the Government in the 2021-2026 tenure, and get an insight into opportunities to expand their business in Việt Nam.
Investors offered suggestions on how to promote and take advantage of investment and technology, innovation and digital transformation.
Since Việt Nam and the WEF established relations in 1989, their co-operative ties have been enhanced in various spheres.
Vietnamese government leaders have regularly attended WEF Davos meetings as well as regional meetings on East Asia and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN)
Việt Nam has coordinated with the WEF to organise many major socio-economic and diplomatic events in the Southeast Asian nation. The WEF and a number of Vietnamese ministries and agencies have also launched cooperation programmes.
Việt Nam is also a key partner of the WEF within the framework of the “New Vision for Agriculture”.
Big opportunities for both
The first national strategic dialogue between Việt Nam and the WEF is of great significance in the context that countries, including Việt Nam, are starting a phase of safe adaptation to the COVID-19 pandemic, accelerating economic recovery and development in the "new normal".
The dialogue is an opportunity for WEF and foreign investors to directly listen to and discuss with the Prime Minister about the Government's socio-economic development goals and potential for the 2021-2025 term. They then can seize opportunities to expand investment and business activities in Việt Nam.
At the same time, they could give advice and suggestions on promoting and taking advantage of the driving forces in investment and technology, innovation and digital transformation.
The organisation of this dialogue also showed that WEF and its member groups and enterprises appreciate Việt Nam's development potential and strategic position.
The dialogue also presented their wishes to join the Government of Việt Nam to realise its development goals.
To Việt Nam, through the dialogue, the country expected to call for further investment and resources to realise its development goals.
The dialogue would also help the country to further determine direction for economic restructuring, innovating the growth model towards sustainability, exploiting the growth drivers from innovation and digital transformation.
The dialogue aimed to convey to global corporations the vision, aspirations and goals that Việt Nam set out in the 10-year socio-economic development strategy 2021-2030, striving to become a developing country by 2030 with modern industry and high middle income.
By 2045, it wants to become a developed country with high income.
Through the dialogue, PM Chính also sent a message to WEF and foreign corporations, businesses and investors about Việt Nam's development aspirations and COVID-19 adaptation policy.
Việt Nam is ready to welcome foreign investors to invest and expand production in the country.
Việt Nam has determined and made efforts with drastic, strong and effective solutions to control and adapt to the pandemic and then recover the economy, attract investment and gain trust by foreign investors and enterprises thanks to the improved investment and business environment in the country.
The Government of Việt Nam has developed many policies and measures to restructure the economy, renew the growth model towards sustainability, exploit the growth drivers from innovation and digital transformation, mobilise and attract high-quality foreign technology and investment from the world's leading corporations and enterprises.
During the pandemic, Việt Nam’s leaders have held many dialogues and exchanges with foreign businesses and investors to solve issues relating to COVID-19 vaccination for workers, resume safe production, circulation and transport of goods as well as restore labour supply chain.
Breakthroughs expected in public-private partnership
The dialogue with the theme "Strengthening public-private partnerships" is especially meaningful for Việt Nam in mobilising all resources, especially from the private sector, for disease response, economic recovery and socio-economic development.
The Government of Việt Nam and Prime Minister Phạm Minh Chính have determined that the public-private partnership method plays a very important role in mobilising and effectively using all domestic and foreign resources on the principles of harmonised benefits and risk sharing among stakeholders.
In recent years, localities in Việt Nam have implemented many models of public-private partnership.
An example is the public leadership - private governance model in which the government builds infrastructure of industrial parks and export processing zones and then allows businesses to manage them and call for investment.
Another example is the private investment – public use model in which private business constructs buildings and the Government rents the buildings to use as offices – a way to save costs and time.
Another PPP model is that private companies joined bids to manage and operate sites like museums, libraries or parks.
Coastal Quảng Ninh province is the most prominent example for effectively taking advantage of PPP models, particularly in transport infrastructure development.
It was the first province to build a mechanism, requesting the Government to allow investment in building highways, airports and tourism infrastructure with the funds it mobilised by itself.
With nearly VNĐ10 trillion from the State budget for site clearance and more than VNĐ32.5 trillion mobilised from private investors in the projects developed under the form of Build-Operate-Transfer, the province has built an airport and nearly 100km of highway.
The province actively developed and implemented PPP models with the principle that the State does not directly do what people and businesses can do and do better.
Since 2012, Quảng Ninh has attracted hundreds of trillions of Vietnamese đồng through taking public investment to reassure and attract private investors. On average, 1 đồng of the State budget helped attract 8.3 đồng of non-State capital. —VNS