Tra Vinh boosts economic growth through luring investment

During the year, nearly 80 domestic and foreign investors came to study the local incentives in investment, doubling the number of 2016, including 35 investors from Japan, the Republic of Korea, Singapore, the US, Turkey and Malaysia.

As a result, the locality licensed 49 investment projects, encompassing five foreign ones with total registered capital of US$143 million, and 44 domestic ones worth nearly VND3.5 trillion (US$153.3 million).

On aggregate, 59 projects worth over VND153.8 trillion (US$6.7 billion) are being carried out at industrial and economic zones in the province.

The inflow of investment has made positive impacts on local development. The gross regional domestic product (GRDP) saw annual average growth of 11% over the past five years. In 2017, the GRDP expanded by over 12%, the highest level over the past four years.

The provincial economic structure continues to shift toward higher proportion of industry-construction and services and lower proportion of agriculture, forestry and fishery.

The per capita average income was estimated at more than VND39.2 million (US$1,716) in 2017.

Chairman of the provincial People’s Committee Dong Van Lam said Tra Vinh will push ahead with administrative reforms and promote the one-stop-shop mechanism to create a friendly environment for investors.

At the same time, the province will give incentives to invite investors to implement high technology projects and highly competitive sectors such as the brackish shrimp breeding project on 100-200 hectares, the cultivation of shrimp-forest and shrimp-rice models on 800-1,000 hectares, and the manufacturing, processing and sale of coconut products on 20,000-30,000 hectares.

The province also looks to develop tourism projects including the establishment of a nearly 65 hectare cultural area at Ba Om pond in the southwest of Tra Vinh city and a 30 hectare hot spring resort in Duyen Hai town, he added.

Tra Vinh will support businesses with land clearance, technical infrastructure investment, labour training, and promotion of trade, investment and tourism.

Lam said the provincial Party’s Committee aims to bring Tra Vinh into the group of middle-range provinces in the Mekong Delta by 2020.

The province will optimise its strengths and potential to help investors expand operation to create an important driving force for the local economic development breakthroughs, he added.