 Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh and Bulgarian President Rumen Radev. Photo: VGP/Nhat Bac |
President Radev agreed with PM Chinh's proposals on six key areas of cooperation that the two countries need to strengthen in the coming time.
First, it is necessary to enhance political trust through increasing delegation exchange, thereby promoting cooperation across various fields.
Second, Vietnam and Bulgaria will boost trade and investment cooperation with the aim of raising bilateral trade turnover to 500 million USD in the coming time.
Third, they will strengthen education cooperation, a traditional area of collaboration between the two countries.
Fourth, they will promote enhance labour cooperation, a field with significant complementary potential.
Fifth, they will increase coordination and mutual support at regional and international forums, such as the United Nations, ASEM, and the ASEAN-EU framework.
Sixth, they agreed to promote people-to-people exchanges and collaboration in organising activities commemorating the 75th anniversary of their diplomatic relations in 2025.
Mr. Radev affirmed that he will advocate for the remaining EU countries to swiftly ratify the EU-Vietnam Investment Protection Agreement (EVIPA) and support the European Commission (EC) in removing the "yellow card" warning against Vietnam's seafood exports to the EU market.
Both sides agreed to continue effectively implementing the cooperation framework, including signed agreements, and to strengthen collaboration in traditional areas such as defence-security, trade-investment, science-technology, education-training, medicine, culture, and people-to-people exchanges.
Additionally, they committed to expanding cooperation to potential complementary areas such as digital transformation, digital data building and connectivity, artificial intelligence, electronics, labour, agriculture, and food security.
The two sides also agreed to support each other in serving as gateways for their goods to enter the ASEAN and EU markets.
The President said Vietnam is one of Bulgaria's most potential markets in Southeast Asia, adding that nearly 30 leading Bulgarian businesses accompanying him on this visit and will attend the Vietnam-Bulgaria Business Forum, to be held in Ho Chi Minh City on Wednesday.