Global investment by Vietnamese businesses reached 2.65 billion USD in the first quarter this year, according to the Foreign Investment Agency (FIA) under the Ministry of Planning and Investment.

In the reviewed period, 22 new overseas investment projects worth 720.7 million USD were granted licenses, while five projects got additional investment of 1.9 billion USD.

Rusvietpetro joint venture of PetroVietnam in Russia added 1.4 billion USD to its capital and the Vietnam National Chemical Group poured 518.9 million USD in a rock salt mine in Laos .

Vietnamese investors mainly engaged in mine ores, accounting for 72.3 percent of the total registered capital, followed by hotels and food service (12.6 percent) and information and telecommunication (8.9 percent).

In the first quarter, 12 foreign countries and territories absorbed Vietnamese outward investment of which Russia received 1.4 billion USD, representing 52.7 percent; Laos, 20.1 percent and Myanmar, 11.3 percent.

The FIA reported that as of March 20, there were 742 outward investment projects with total registered capital of 15.5 billion USD in 59 foreign countries and territories.

Laos took the lead with 227 projects worth over 4.2 billion USD; followed by Cambodia with 129 projects with 2.7 billion USD, Russia and Venezuela .

Statistics showed that 2.9 billion USD went into petroleum sector; 500 million USD into rubber planting; 400 million USD in hydro-electricity and 249 million USD in telecom.-VNA