Thousands of Thai businesses want to invest in Vietnam

Massively investment

In an effort to expand its business abroad, Hemaraj Company is targeting a number of projects to build industrial parks (IPs) in Nghe An province. Specifically, Hemaraj is researching to invest in 2 projects: WHA Hemaraj 1 Industrial Park - Nghe An, with a total area of ​​more than 2,000 hectares in Nam Cam Industrial Park (Nghi Loc district); WHA Hemaraj 2 Industrial Park - Nghe An, with a total area of ​​more than 1,100 hectares in Tho Loc Industrial Park (Dien Chau district). It is expected that Hemaraj will complete investment procedures next month.

Another Thai investor, RATCH Co., Ltd, also recently worked with the Ministry of Industry and Trade, expressing special interest in the Hai Phong 3 Thermal Power Plant Project and the desire to participate in investing in Vietnam's power source projects.

Talk with a reporter from Investment Newspaper tAt the CLMVT Forum with the theme "Towards a Shared Prosperity" (CLMVT 2016 Forum 2016: Towards a Shared Prosperity" organized by the Thai Ministry of Commerce from 16-18/2016 in Bangkok (Thailand), Ms. Apiradi Tantraporn, Minister of Commerce of Thailand, said that industrial park and thermal power construction projects are among many projects that Thai investors are interested in in Vietnam. Nam.

In the context of Vietnam's increasingly improving investment and business environment and tariff barriers being removed within the framework of the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) and FTAs ​​that Vietnam has and will sign, many Thai investors are planning to expand investment and business to Vietnam.

“Vietnam is an extremely attractive market not only for Thai businesses, but also for many other foreign businesses,” Ms. Tantraporn emphasized.

According to the Ambassador of the Kingdom of Thailand in Vietnam, nearly 2,000 Thai businesses currently express their intention to invest in Vietnam.

Mr. Sanan Angubolkul, Chairman of the Thailand - Vietnam Business Council, said that according to Vietnam's commitments in the AEC and FTAs ​​with partners, reducing and eliminating import taxes for the vast majority of products will help Thai businesses boost investment in Vietnam, and from Vietnam they can export to FTA member countries.

“Thai investors really want to invest more heavily in the Vietnamese market because Thai products are popular with many Vietnamese people,” Mr. Angubolkul said.

Representatives of many Thai companies such as Duay Ruk, Green Siam Marketing, TRI Global, Pharmaceutical Industry, Kito, CT Industry, NMB-Minebea Thai, Gates Unitta... said that they highly appreciate the Vietnamese market and can expand their investment and business here. In the immediate future, they will promote products through fairs and exhibitions.

In recent years, many large Thai projects have appeared in Vietnam. Most recently, in the retail sector, Central Group officially completed the acquisition of Big C Vietnam (owned by the French Casino Group), with a contract value of nearly 1.1 billion USD.

Early last year, Central Group also acquired 49% of the shares of Nguyen Kim electronics supermarket chain. Also in the wave of Thai investment in the Vietnamese retail market, Thai Charoen Corp (TCC) spent 876 million USD to acquire the Metro Cash & Carry Vietnam supermarket system (Germany). In 2013, Berli Jucker, a subsidiary of TCC, also acquired the Family Mart convenience store chain in Vietnam and then changed the chain's name to B's Mart.

Improving the investment environment

According to Ms. Ponpimon Petcharakul, Commercial Counselor (Thai Embassy in Vietnam), although the Vietnamese market is very attractive, in order to attract more high-quality investment projects with large capital from Thailand, Vietnam needs to promote administrative reform and improve the quality of infrastructure and human resources.

Some Thai businesses that Investment Newspaper reporters had the opportunity to meet said that the biggest barrier in Vietnam is the weak infrastructure and complicated administrative procedures.

"We have worked with a number of localities in Vietnam to implement a number of agricultural product processing and wastewater treatment projects. However, through research, we found that incentives for these projects in Vietnam are not high, not to mention that administrative procedures in general are still quite cumbersome," said Mr. Komol Wongthongsri, representative of a large Thai company.

Talking about the business environment in Vietnam, Mr. Sesto Vecchi, a lawyer at Russin & Vecchi Law Firm (USA), who has more than 30 years of experience practicing law in Vietnam, said that when investing in Vietnam, foreign businesses are often most concerned about administrative procedures in the areas of customs clearance, tax payment and licensing.

“Vietnam needs to minimize unnecessary regulations and immediately abolish barriers that domestic and foreign businesses are facing,” Mr. Vecchi recommended.