The southern localities of Dong Nai, Binh Duong and Ho Chi Minh City have reported highly positive signs in attracting Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) this year.

These localities’ in charge officials said the third quarter in particular has seen an increase in the number of new projects and investments.

English language daily Vietnam News quoted Bo Ngoc Thu, director of the Dong Nai Department of Planning and Investment as saying that the province attracted a total FDI of 1.063 billion USD in the first nine months of the year, including newly-registered projects and additional capital for existing ones. This marked a year-on-year increase of 45.6 percent.

Most of the investors are from Japan , the Republic of Korea and Singapore . Japanese firms are investing in 17 new projects worth 510 million USD, accounting for 44 percent of the total number of FDI projects and 83 percent of newly registered capital.

The new projects are mainly located in industrial parks. Some of them will promote development of the supporting industry, for example, assembling or manufacturing machinery parts, healthcare equipment and cable and satellite TV production.

Disbursed capital in Dong Nai also increased to 850 million USD in the first nine months, twice as much as the same period last year, marking an increase of 6.25 percent compared to this year's target.

Lu Thanh Phong, deputy director of the HCM City Department of Planning and Investment, said just in the third quarter of this year, 100 FDI projects were licensed, an increase of 9.89 percent compared to the same period of last year.

Newly registered capital in the third quarter reached 199.42 million USD, an increase of 70.6 percent over the same period last year.

In the first nine months of 2012, the city attracted 278 FDI projects, an increase of 3.35 percent compared to the corresponding period of last year.

Phong said the countries bringing FDI capital into HCM City were mainly Japan , Singapore and the Philippines . For instance, Singapore has 44 projects worth nearly 242 million USD and Japan has 65 projects with a total investment capital of nearly 90 million USD.

The Binh Duong Department of Planning and Investment, meanwhile, said the FDI inflow into the province this year was mainly in the services and urban development sectors with several big investments including a 1.2 billion USD project by the Tokyu Corporation and a 95 million USD project by Aeon Vietnam.-VNA