Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh attends the Vietnam-RoK Business Forum (photo: VOV)

Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh's first official visit to the Republic of Korea drew attention from the political and business communities of the two countries. Both countries consider economic cooperation a pillar of their bilateral relationship.

Promoting economic cooperation is a highlight of PM Pham Minh Chinh's visit

Prime Minister Chinh's visit reflected Vietnam’s high regard for its comprehensive strategic partnership with the RoK. The agenda of the visit clearly showed that PM Chinh wanted to promote bilateral trade and investment cooperation. More than half of his 30 activities in South Korea were economy-related events.

The Prime Minister delivered speeches at the Business Forum, the Culture Cooperation and Tourism Promotion Forum, and the Vietnam-RoK Labor Forum, and met with experts and representatives of economic organizations to discuss semi-conductors and AI.

Mr. Chinh also had a series of meetings with representatives of Korean groups who are planning to expand investment in Vietnam in biotechnology, steel, energy, and trade.

At all these meetings Mr. Chinh stressed that Vietnam listens to investors and removes bottlenecks and barriers to create the most favorable conditions for their operation in Vietnam.

He told the Vietnam-RoK Business Forum: “Investing in Vietnam, you’re guaranteed of political stability and equal opportunity in production and trade. Together we can exploit, develop, and create new values for our countries.”

Cooperation agreements

The most notable achievement of the visit was the leaders’ high consensus in promoting the comprehensive strategic partnership. Both sides agreed to coordinate closely to raise bilateral trade turnover to 100 billion USD by 2025 and 150 billion USD by 2030 in a balanced and sustainable direction. To achieve this goal, they pledged to effectively deploy bilateral and multilateral economic cooperation mechanisms, including promptly approving the mutual accreditation of priority enterprises program.

They agreed to allow the export of Vietnamese grapefruit and Korean melons to the other’s market this year, committed to closer cooperation in agro-forestry and seafood trade, and promised to encourage Korean businesses to expand investment in Vietnam’s key industries.

Prime Minister Chinh pledged to work closely and effectively implement bilateral development cooperation projects worth 52 million USD in 2024. The two countries agreed to expand the number of Vietnamese working in South Korea, particularly in shipbuilding, information technology, and services.

The two countries signed 9 cooperation documents on development, trade, investment, small and medium enterprises, innovation, startups, the environment, competition, consumer protection, and education.

The results achieved during Prime Minister Chinh's visit to the RoK laid a foundation for the two sides to further expand bilateral cooperation as each other’s top trade partner.