Vietnam, Laos Aim for $1B Trade This Year
Vietnam and its neighboring nation of Laos have agreed to boost the implementation of the 2008-2015 trade development project in order to raise the bilateral trade to $1 billion in 2010 and $2 billion in 2015.
Vietnamese Deputy Minister of Industry and Trade Nguyen Thanh Bien and his Lao counterpart, Khemmani Pholssena signed an agreement on the issue in Vientiane on June 7 during the former’s five-day visit to Laos ended on the same day.
The two nations also agreed to offer the same preferential tariffs on Vietnam- and Laos-originated imports and exports in 2011 as in 2010.
They plan to study the possibility of signing a free trade agreement (FTA), and building a Vietnam-Laos border market network and the Tay Trang-Sop Hun and Bo Y-Phu Cua border trade areas.
The two-way trade rose 16.8% from a year earlier to $96 million in the first quarter of this year, the General Department of Customs said.
Vietnam’s export staples to Laos are coal, petroleum products, paper products, apparel, iron and steel while its main imports are wood products and metals. (VNA)
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