Vietnam is accelerating the equitisation of State-owned enterprises, offering a number of opportunities for international investors, including German investors, to become shareholders and partners in Vietnamese businesses, Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung informed the Vietnam-Baden Wuerttemberg Economic Forum on October 14.

Speaking at the forum as part of his official visit to Germany, the Vietnamese Government leader called for investments in infrastructure upgrades and public services provision via public-private partnerships (PPP), since Vietnam urgently needed capital to implement projects on electricity and renewable energy, urban transport, and sea and air ports.

Vietnam and Germany enjoy a long-standing cooperative relationship, which continues to grow in all areas. Germany is now Vietnam’s largest trade partner in Europe, with bilateral trade reaching almost 8 billion USD in 2013, accounting for more than 20 percent of the total turnover between Vietnam and the EU.

It is also one of the biggest providers of official development assistance (ODA) for Vietnam.

Vietnam welcomed investments from Germany in high-quality, high-tech and environmentally-friendly projects, the PM said, adding that leading German companies, such as Siemens, Mercedes-Benz, Adidas and Allianz, were already successfully operating in Vietnam.

However, Germany’s investment potential in Vietnam is still not fully exploited, he stated. Germany ranks fifth out of the 23 European countries that invest in Vietnam with 232 projects worth nearly 1.5 billion USD.

He suggested the two sides step up their efforts in the fields of business and investment and utilise their respective strengths and potential in order to meet their cooperation goals.

Earlier that day, Prime Minister Dung met with Minister President of Baden Wuerttemberg Winfried Kretschmann, who expressed his wish to boost linkages between Baden Wuerttemberg and Vietnamese localities, particularly in the fields of education and training, and manufacturing.-VNA