Representatives of the 21 Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) member economies gathered in Hanoi on March 2 for the first APEC Senior Official Meeting (SOM1).

This is the first major conference held in Vietnam as part of the 2006 APEC Year. Issues to be discussed at the SOM 1 meeting will provide orientations for the whole 2006 APEC Year and serve as a foundation for the next SOM conferences to agree upon issues for submission to APEC ministers and economic leaders in November this year.

Addressing the opening ceremony, Deputy Prime Minister Vu Khoan said: ”It is the great honour and responsibility to be the host of APEC, one of the world’s leading economic forums. Therefore, we will do our best to live up your trust.  From our side, we also look forward to seeing your close co-ordination with Vietnam to make APEC 2006 a great success and a new stage in the forum’s development.

“In the near two decades since its inception, under the fundamental principle of “voluntary, consensus and non-binding”, APEC has proved its vitality and played an active role in the region and the world. Through a diverse range of activities, APEC has significantly contributed to the promotion of co-operation in economic, trade, investment and technological fields among member economies while at the same time contributing an important voice to multilateral negotiations within the WTO framework. Similarly, the APEC process has helped boost mutual understanding among peoples of APEC members, increased co-ordination in response to common challenges and promoted peace, co-operation and development in the region.

Today’s world presents us with both many new opportunities and challenges. Following the financial and monetary crisis of late 1990s that seriously affected many member economies, APEC is now the most dynamic economic region of the world. Trade and investment within APEC has been sharply rising, which has had positive impacts on the global economy.

Against that backdrop, the theme of APEC 2006 “Towards a dynamic community for sustainable development and prosperity” is of great relevance. To translate this theme into reality, strong efforts are required by senior officials. We hope that with all your strength and talents, you will work closely together to launch new ideas and initiatives in preparation for the summit meeting in November and bring about a new momentum for the APEC process.

“In short, the ultimate goal of our co-operation is to bring about welfare for our people and underpin the coherence in the diversity of our peoples. To that end, we need to pay special attention to promoting people-to-people contacts, developing tourism and fostering cultural and educational co-operation.

“To fulfil our diverse missions, it is the time for us to carry out reforms and make the PAEC forum work more effectively and conveniently. In this regard, I believe you, the most experienced members, could contribute to our works.

“This is the 20^th year of Vietnam’s renovation process. Thanks to such reforms, our country has maintained a rather high economic growth rate. For instance, our GDP growth rate increased by 8.4 percent in 2005. The living standards of our people have been improved. The proportion of poor household has been halved. Our society has been stable and our foreign relations have been continuously expanded.

“We are determined to speed up our reforms by promoting fast and sustainable development with a view to getting our country out of an underdevelopment situation by 2010 to create the premises for turning Vietnam into an industrialised nation by 2020.

“To fulfil this goal, we need an international community and must integrate into the regional and global economies. In this regards, we are trying our best to conclude bilateral negotiations with a small number of partners left in order to join the WTO as soon as possible. We would like to take this opportunity to express our deep gratitude to other member economies for their active support for Vietnam in negotiations to join the WTO soon.

“As the host of APEC Year 2006, Vietnam will have the opportunity to introduce our potentials, socio-economic achievements and accomplishments of our domestic and foreign policies to friends in the region in order to intensify the mutually beneficial co-operation for the prosperity of all peoples. I believe that this aspiration will be turned into a reality following SOM I.”

Regarding the conference, Peruvian ambassador Juan Capunay, who is a senior APEC official, praised Vietnam for contributing many new and creative ideas and its preparatory work for the APEC meetings. This is a good opportunity for Peru, the host country of the 2008 APEC to gain some organisation experience from Vietnam. With the successful organisation of the SOM1 meeting, it is believed that Vietnam will surely to make the 2006 APEC Summit a success.