Strengthening Vietnam - Saudi Arabia Business Cooperation

This is the first visit of the Saudi Arabian business delegation to Vietnam in an attempt to seek opportunities for trade and investment cooperation with Vietnamese partners. Saudi Arabian attending businesses mainly operate in office machinery, transportation services, oil equipment and services, melamine, plastic, aluminium, food and lubricant.

 

Dr Vu Tien Loc, Chairman of VCCI, said the visit by the Council of Saudi Chambers of Commerce tagged along the State visit of Vietnamese President Nguyen Minh Triet to Saudi Arabia, expressing deep interests of Saudi Arabian businesses in the Vietnamese market and partners. This is an important opportunity to reinforce commercial and industrial cooperation relations between the two countries. Mr Loc also hoped the business communities of the two nations will have specific agreements and measures to promote investment cooperation development.

 

Deputy Minister of Planning and Investment, Nguyen Bich Dat, said, with its profound experience and strength in developing energy industry, infrastructure, construction, transportation services and finance, Saudi Arabia is one of important economic partners of Vietnam. “The forum is a good opportunity for both sides to introduce investment environments and opportunities as well as exchange solutions to further bilateral economic and commercial relations as well as business communities of Vietnam and Saudi Arabia,” said Mr Dat.

According to Mr Dat, the Ministry of Planning and Investment commits to work closely and support businesses of both nations to carry out investment cooperation activities to bring the bilateral ties to a new plane.

 

Specially, according to Mr Ly Quoc Hung, Director of Africa and Southwest Asia Department under the Ministry of Trade and Industry, Saudi Arabia is the largest market in the region and has a very demand for Vietnamese goods while Vietnamese commodities can penetrate surrounding markets trough Saudi Arabia. In return, Vietnam, with its deeper regional and global integration, is a potential market for Saudi Arabian goods and the Southeast Asian nation Vietnam is a wide gateway for Saudi Arabia to make inroads into the ASEAN market.

 

According to statistics, Vietnam - Saudi Arabia trade turnover progressed in the past years. The two-way trade revenues totalled US$455 million in 2009, of which Vietnam earned US$103 million from exports to Saudi Arabia and spent US$352 million on commodities from this market. Vietnam’s main exports to Saudi Arabia included seafood, fabrics, textiles, footwear, wooden products, rice, cashew nuts, pepper, computers, coal and tea while its imports from Saudi Arabia consisted of plastic materials, gas, steel, motorcars, chemicals and fertilisers.

 

However, according to both sides, the results are incommensurate with potentialities.

 

Mr Talal A. Mirza, Chairman of the Makah Chamber of Commerce of Saudi Arabia, said: There are certain hindrances in the two-way economic relationships, that is to say, the absence of direct air routes and far geographic distance.

 

These major difficulties put a brake on trade and cause prices of goods to go up. Besides, the exchange of Riyal and VND is not properly cared. Besides, Vietnamese workers in Saudi Arabia do not speak English well, leading to unsatisfactory manpower supply cooperation between the two countries.

 

Furthermore, according to Mr Talal A. Mirza, the two countries lack market information of each other. “At this forum, I believe that the governments and businesses of the two countries will have specific agreements and measures to tackle difficulties in trade and investment cooperation development,” said Mr Talal A. Mirza.

 

Mr Talal A. Mirza said, in the future, Saudi Arabia businesses will work with Vietnamese authorities to discuss more about Saudi Arabia’s investment and cooperation in rice cultivation in Vietnam. In the near future, Saudi Arabia will support Vietnam to export not only rice but also wheat and other agricultural products of high quality to Saudi Arabia. “After this visit, Saudi Arabia will send other business delegations to Vietnam to discuss specific cooperation in agriculture with Vietnam because this is really a very important field for Saudi Arabia,” said Mr Talal A.Mirza.