Business

European firms optimistic about Vietnam’s business environment

European firms continued to be optimistic about the business environment in Vietnam, according to the EuroCham’s latest Business Climate Index (BCI).
European firms optimistic about Vietnam’s business environment ảnh 1Workers at a manufacturing plant of mobile phone spare parts in Vietnam (Illustrative image. Source: VNA) 


HCM City (VNA) – European firms continued to beoptimistic about the business environment in Vietnam, according to the EuroCham’slatest Business Climate Index (BCI).

Accordingly, the BCI for the first quarter of 2018 is 78points, up 1 point from the previous quarterly survey.

However, the percentage of respondents rating the businesssituation as excellent dropped by nearly 10 percent, with an increase of 7percent in respondents describing the situation as good. Negative responses wereat almost the same level as in Q4 of 2017.

More respondents showed their confidence of a stable and continuouslyimproving macroeconomic scenario in Vietnam with a 9 percent increase, whilethose expecting no change in the next quarter increased by nearly 10 percent.

The survey showed that inflation was not a major concern forEuroCham members, with 84 percent believing it will have either no or minorimpact.

Regarding headcount, the number of businesses expecting tomaintain the current size of their workforce remained at 40 percent, while 12percent will significantly increase their workforce. Responses indicatingintention to reduce headcount a little bit accounted for 5 percent compared to 10percent in the previous quarter.

Meanwhile, 45 percent of the respondents said they intend tomaintain their level of investment, a 9 percent rise.

EuroCham Co-Chairman Nicolas Audier said that the BCI surveyresults for Q1, 2018 continued to show positive expectations from EuroCham memberstoward Vietnam, albeit not at the same levels of optimism as in 2016.

“EuroCham hopes that this interest inspires the VietnameseGovernment to improve the business environment further, particularly regardingthe changes to the legal framework that will enable Vietnam to fulfil itscommitments under the EU-Vietnam Free Trade Agreement, expected to come intoforce later this year,” he said.

Audier noted that even though the BCI score is very positive(78 out of 100), there is still quite some legal and regulatory work to do inVietnam.

He added that EuroCham is confident that current hurdles to liberalisationwill be surpassed and the next survey will again reflect an excellent outlookfrom the perspective of the European and Europe-related business community inVietnam.-VNA

VNA
#European firms #optimistic #business environment #EuroCham #Business Climate Index #survey #EU-Vietnam Free Trade Agreement #vietnamplus #Vietnam News Agency Vietnam European Union
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