A recent survey of the Japan Bank for International Cooperation (JBIC) has found that 36.4 percent of Japanese businesses operating overseas viewed Vietnam as a promising investment destination, up 2.5 percent from 2018.

Vietnam has risen to third in the JBIC rankings with 36.4 percent of the vote, and also made the most impressive progress among the top 10 markets for Japanese businesses.

Winning 47.8 percent of the vote, India was chosen as the top potential market for Japanese firms, while China dropped to the second position with 44.6 percent, down 7.6 percent over 2018.

Thailand fell to fourth position with 32.9 percent, followed by Indonesia and the US.

In the 10-year outlook, Vietnam also ranked third with 34.8 percent after India and China.

The JBIC said that Japanese firms have high confidence in Vietnam’s future growth as well as a low-cost and high quality labour force.

However, they also expressed concern over fierce competition as well as rising labour costs and difficulties in recruiting management personnel, stated the survey.