Vietnam economy "making up for lost time" : Singapore's Lee
HANOI - Vietnam is "making up for lost time" in its growing enthusiasm for the market economy, Singapore's Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew said during a visit to the communist-ruled country.
Vietnam last week joined the World Trade Organisation, a step expected to further raise foreign investment and trade in the country that saw over eight percent economic growth last year, second in East Asia only to China.
Lee said he first visited Vietnam in 1992, but said during repeat visits in the 1990s he felt "there was not much transformation because at that time Vietnam was still not ready to take steps to become a market economy."
He praised Vietnam's new, younger political leadership in a meeting with Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung, 57, who took office last year, and said now "Vietnam is moving at good speed and making up for lost time."
Lee, on a five-day visit focused on boosting economic cooperation between the wealthy city-state and Vietnam, was due to meet President Nguyen Minh Triet and Communist Party leader Nong Duc Manh on Wednesday.
On Thursday, he is scheduled to fly to the southern commercial hub of Ho Chi Minh City to visit the nearby Vietnam-Singapore Industrial Park in Binh Duong province, north of the city formerly called Saigon.
Launched in 1996, the 500-hectare (1,200 acre) park is a base for over 200 companies, including Kimberly Clark and Konica, which have invested a total of one billion dollars and employ more than 38,000 people, the park's website says.
A second, 345-hectare park is being developed 32 kilometres (20 miles) north of Ho Chi Minh City in the Binh Duong New Township. It will also have education and training centres and residential apartments, the park's website says.
Lee is joined by Singapore's Finance and Transport Minister Lim Hwee Hua, Trade and Industry Minister S Iswaran and other officials, the government said.
Vietnam had become one of Singapore's major trade and investment partners in Southeast Asia, Vietnam's foreign ministry spokesman Le Dung said last week.
Bilateral trade reached 6.7 billion dollars in the first 11 months of 2006, said Singapore's embassy in Hanoi. Singaporean exports to Vietnam topped 5.2 billion dollars, and imports from Vietnam reached 1.5 billion dollars.
Agence France Presse - January 16, 2007.
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