Though the fight against the pandemic in HCMC is more difficult than in Bac Ninh and Bac Giang for various reasons, "the government and the people of Vietnam will not fail the trust of foreign companies," he said during a visit to a Samsung plant in the northern province of Thai Nguyen Friday.

The company’s request to vaccinate its employees is "reasonable," and the government is vaccinating local people for free with priority given to workers, including Samsung’s, he said.

It is also prioritizing vaccination in Covid hotspots like HCMC and southern localities, where Samsung has factories, he said.

He said due to a global shortage of vaccines Vietnam wants the South Korean government’s support, but it is also pushing ahead with research into and production of vaccines.

He called on Samsung to increase its sourcing of parts, equipment and materials made in Vietnam.

CEO Choi Joo Ho said Samsung would pay attention to the PM’s requests, including to have more Vietnamese in senior management positions. It is working on helping Vietnamese companies add more value to products they supply to his company, he said.

Human resource training is a part of Samsung’s business philosophy, and it would continue to focus on this as the PM suggested, he said.

Samsung, the biggest foreign investor in Vietnam, has six plants and is building a new research and development center in Hanoi, which will open next year. Around 3,000 Vietnamese engineers are set to be employed there.

The South Korean company has invested over $17.7 billion in Vietnam, has 110,000 employees and exported over $56 billion worth of products last year.

It reported 10 percent year-on-year growth revenue in the first seven months, and expects to surpass its export targets this year if its plants in HCMC could resume production soon, CEO Choi Joo Ho said.