Australian Prime Minister invited to visit Vietnam
VOV.VN - Vietnamese Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh has extended his invitation to his Australian counterpart Anthony Albanese to pay an official visit to Vietnam, during a reception for Australian Minister for Trade and Tourism Don Farrell in Hanoi on April 17.
Chinh welcomed the results of the third Vietnam - Australia Economic Partnership Meeting during which both sides reviewed bilateral economic cooperation and implementation of the 2021 Australia - Vietnam Enhanced Economic Engagement Strategy, as well as introducing solutions to enhance the efficiency of cooperation.
He noted with satisfaction the positive developments in bilateral relations, especially in trade and investment cooperation, saying two-way trade last year hit US$15,7 billion, a year on year rise of 22%. Australia became Vietnam’s seventh largest trading partner and Vietnam became Australia’s 10th largest trading partner.
The PM suggested that the two sides boost trade exchanges in a more balanced way by increasing the export of Vietnamese products to Australia.
Vietnam expects Australia will further facilitate the access of Vietnamese electronics, footwear, textiles and agricultural products to the Australian market to help create jobs for people in the context of shrinking markets globally, he said.
He suggested that the two sides seek new cooperation mechanisms and strengthen cooperation in a number of strong fields such as education - training, digital economy, innovation, renewable energy, labour, tourism, high-tech agriculture, as well as people-to-people exchanges.
The PM also expected that Australia would help Vietnam build an independent and self-reliant economy closely associated with active international integration, and share experiences in the fields of innovation, technology transfer, human resource training, digital economy, green economy, circular economy, energy transformation and climate change response.
Minister Don Farrell, for his part, affirmed that Vietnam plays an important role in Australia’s strategy of diversifying trade partners, and that the large Vietnamese community in Australia is a factor in promoting relations between the two countries.
He said Australia would coordinate with Vietnamese ministries and agencies to realize the PM’s proposals, and hoped Vietnam would help to further promote Australia-ASEAN relations and strengthen cooperation in other multilateral mechanisms such as the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP).
