A seminar calling for Japanese investors to the five Mekong regional countries of Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand and Vietnam was held in Tokyo on Dec. 21.

As part of the Mekong-Japan Exchange Year 2009, the event was co-hosted by the ASEAN-Japan Centre, the embassies and the investment management agencies of the five targeted nations.

When addressing the seminar, Keiichi Ono, Director of the First Southeast Asia Division of the Japanese Foreign Ministry’s Southeast and Southwest Asia Department, emphasised the results achieved during the year, including the successful organisation of the second Mekong-Japan Foreign Ministers’ Meeting in Cambodia’s Siem Reap and the first Mekong-Japan high-level meeting in Tokyo.

Ono urged the regional countries to step up the public-private partnership and called upon Japanese enterprises to increase the flow of investments in the region, as a move to implement agreements signed at the first Mekong-Japan high-level meeting, especially to achieve the target of comprehensive development in the region.

Representatives from the five nations presented their respective potentials for economic growth as well as the latest economic-investment policies.

Dinh Lam Tan, an official at the Ministry of Planning and Investment, also highlighted Vietnam’s advantages of its investment environment, including political-social stability, high economic growth, abundant workforce, and low labour costs.

The government of Vietnam has spared no efforts to improve the investment environment, adopted investment incentives and accelerated its international economic integration by joining the World Trade Organisation and signing free trade agreements both bilaterally and multilaterally, he said.

Tan said that now is the best time for Japanese investors to invest in Vietnam , adding that the enforcement of the Vietnam-Japan Economic Partnership Agreement as of October 2009 is offering more chances for them./.