A meeting between Mr Simon Pugh, President of Auscham Vietnam and VCCI Chairman Pham Tan Cong at VCCI's headquarter.

Mr Simon Pugh, President of Auscham Vietnam, provided our reporter with an exclusive interview on this topic.

VCCI and Auscham Vietnam have had several partnership initiatives in the past. Could you tell us more about this partnership?

The year 2023 is an important milestone in the bilateral relationship between Vietnam and Australia as the two countries celebrate the 50th anniversary of establishing diplomatic relations. Over the past 5 decades, the relationship between the two countries has gone through many stages and is now developing to a new level, in which cooperation activities are expanded, especially in the field of economy and trade.

Australia is promoting its relationship with Southeast Asia, in which Vietnam is one of the countries that it focuses on. The two governments have also signed the Australia – Vietnam Enhanced Economic Engagement Strategy (EEES) with to the aim of our countries becoming top 10 trading partners of each other.

Therefore, during this visit to VCCI, we discussed the achieved successes and the limit ations that the two sides need to overcome to advance the cooperation between the business communities of the two countries. In particular, Auscham and VCCI exchanged to develop action plans and practical programs to realize the EEES Strategy.

Many initiatives have been taken recently by Vietnamese and Australian businesses to encourage cooperation in a variety of sectors. Sir, in which sectors will Australian businesses boost investment in Vietnam in the near future?

In the current context, I think that businesses of the two countries need to prioritize cooperation in mutually beneficial and highly complementary fields such as climate change response, digital transformation, green development, clean energy, and sustainable supply chain. These will probably be the new pillars of cooperation to upgrade the Vietnam-Australia strategic partnership to a new level.

Specifically, Australian businesses have strengths in the field of food production. Vietnam is Australia's fourth largest agricultural export market, with the advantage of being geographically close. This will present a growing opportunity for premium food and wine producers.

With the success of RMIT University,Vietnam and Australia still have a lot of work to do in the education sector. There are currently 300 different partnerships between Australian universities and Vietnamese educational institutions and we are further expanding this area, especially in developing training workshops for senior leaders of enterprises, as well as vocational education programes for Vietnamese workers.

I know that Vietnam is in the process of realizing its goals introduced at COP26. Australia and Vietnam are both accelerating their energy transition aspirations. Australia is also one of Vietnam's largest energy partners. Therefore, the field of energy and green energy transformation will be a potential aspect to attract businesses from Australia as we have advantages in technology and experience in wind and solar power development.

Besides, the capacity of Australian businesses in the clean energy supply chain and associated services can also help Vietnam manage the massive transition it faces.

How can Vietnam, in your opinion, attract more high-quality investment flows from Australia in the future?

In order to further promote the investment capital of Australian businesses in particular and foreign enterprises in general, I think that Vietnam needs to ensure that investors have a thorough understanding of the business environment in Vietnam, as well as being fully informed about potential projects and cooperation partners in high-value fields.

When Australian businesses invest abroad, they are interested in three factors: infrastructure, logistics system and high-quality human resources. I think these are the three main points for Vietnam to focus on in order to attract more FDI in the coming time.

In addition, through strengthening relations with VCCI, the two sides will build a solid and reputable communication channel to exchange necessary investment cooperation information; thereby firmly consolidating the relationship between the business communities of the two countries, contributing to advancde the relationship between Australia and Vietnam.

In the coming time, Auscham will coordinate with VCCI and related parties to build exchange programs and business matching between the two sides... to help Australian businesses better understand the market and investment needs in Vietnam; as well as support Vietnamese businesses to explore cooperation opportunities in Australia.

In particular, in the next 3 months, we are planning to launch a forum to train senior leaders of the business.

In the context of the movement of manufacturing and service industries into Vietnam, I believe that Vietnam will indeed have a strong growth journey and Australian companies will also actively accompany with Vietnamese partners in this process.

Thank you!