Vietnam will join hands with other ASEAN member nations to enhance regional connectivity for investors and companies to do business and make contributions to building the ASEAN Economic Community.

Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung delivered this message at the opening of the ASEAN Business and Investment Summit 2010 (ASEAN-BIS) in Hanoi on October 27.

“After more than four decades of establishment and development, ASEAN has become an integrated politico-economic entity and a successful and dynamic regional organisation that plays an important role in the region and is an indispensable partner of major countries and international organisations in the world,” he said.

The PM stated that ASEAN -- a common market and an emerging unified economic space are being completed on the basis of the great harmony of the national trade principles and the macro-policy coordination capacity among ASEAN members.

Programmes, plans to build up an ASEAN Community, including the Master Plan on ASEAN Connectivity to be adopted on this occasion will create new opportunities to boost trade and investment in the area.

“Enterprises will benefit from greater efficiency of the economy to increase productivity, reduce production cost resulting in affordable prices. Consumers in ASEAN and East Asia will have a more effective choice in terms of price and quality of goods and services,” Dung said.

He went on to say that “This process will create a chain among enterprises in ASEAN and East Asia, further labour allocation in the region, enhance the competitiveness of the region in the world, and generate more jobs, thus contributing to narrowing the rich-poor gap and the development gap and maintaining social stability.”

The government leader called on delegates to focus discussions on common challenges and policies of ASEAN so as to build a closely-connected and growing ASEAN community.

Also on the occasion, ASEAN Secretary General Surin Pitsuwan underlined the bloc’s role in advancing the global economy, saying the centre of growth has moved from the West to the East, and that ASEAN is located in a dynamically growing region.

ASEAN is opening its door to attract investments, managerial experiences and technology transfer from nations outside the region, the ASEAN chief said, adding the group has to date set up cooperation mechanisms among its member countries and a regional fund worth 120 billion USD to support the regional states when they face monetary difficulties.

As an activity held on the sidelines of the 17 th ASEAN Summit, ASEAN-BIS 2010 has drawn the participation of around 1,000 delegates, including government officials, policy makers, experts and business executives, from both in and outside the region.

This year marks the first time ASEAN-BIS to hold dialogues with ASEAN’s partners – Australia , New Zealand , China , Japan , the Republic of Korea , India and Russia . The planned dialogues are initiated by Vietnam with the aim of maintaining and stepping up long-term cooperation between the bloc and its partners.

Within the framework of the summit, the third ASEAN Business Award will be presented to regional companies that have made outstanding performance and greatly contributed to the region’s economic growth./.