On the afternoon of January 8, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh received Mr. Ahmed Hussen, Canadian Minister of International Development, who is visiting and working in Vietnam.
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Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh and Mr. Ahmed Hussen, Canadian Minister of International Development - Photo: VGP/Nhat Bac |
The Prime Minister welcomed Minister Ahmed Hussen for choosing Vietnam as the first country to visit in the Asia-Pacific region in his new position, demonstrating increasingly deep political relations and actively contributing to strengthening the Vietnam-Canada Comprehensive Partnership.
The Prime Minister said that Vietnam attaches importance to its relations with Canada and wishes to work with Canada to promote the Comprehensive Partnership to a new height on the basis of mutual benefit, contributing to maintaining peace, stability and prosperous development in the region and the world; and welcomed Canada's strengthening of ties and promoting cooperation with the region with the announcement of Canada's Indo-Pacific Strategy. On this occasion, the Prime Minister said that he looked forward to welcoming Canadian Prime Minister J. Trudeau to visit Vietnam soon.
The Prime Minister and the Minister were pleased to note that in recent times, despite the difficulties caused by the COVID-19 pandemic and in the context of the world facing many challenges, the relationship between the two countries in the fields of politics-diplomacy, trade-investment, development cooperation, defense-security, culture-education, science-technology and people-to-people exchange has continued to be consolidated and developed.
In particular, development cooperation is a bright spot in the relationship between the two countries. Canada's ODA projects for Vietnam are well implemented, meeting Vietnam's development requirements (in recent years, bilateral ODA for Vietnam is at 10 million CAD).
Currently, Canada is Vietnam's third largest trading partner and Vietnam is Canada's largest trading partner in ASEAN. In 2022, the total bilateral trade turnover reached over 7 billion USD, an increase of nearly 17% compared to 2021. In 2023, in the difficult context of global trade, the total trade exchange between Vietnam and Canada is estimated to reach 6.17 billion USD. Canada is Vietnam's 14th largest investor with 247 projects with a total registered capital of over 4.82 billion USD.
The two sides believe that the potential for development cooperation between the two countries is huge and complementary, and the two sides need to exploit and make the most of this potential through bilateral and multilateral cooperation channels.
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Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh suggested that the two sides continue to promote cooperation in key areas such as economics, trade, investment, education and training, science and technology - Photo: VGP/Nhat Bac |
Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh suggested that the two sides continue to promote cooperation in key areas such as economics, trade, investment, education and training, and science and technology, which are also Canada's strengths and suitable to Vietnam's needs.
On the sidelines of the G7 Summit in Japan, the two countries' Prime Ministers agreed to increase bilateral trade turnover to 10 billion USD, and Vietnam and Canada need to cooperate more closely to achieve this goal.
Thanking Canada for its effective ODA support in the past, especially in poverty reduction, the Prime Minister suggested that in the coming time, ODA cooperation should focus on a number of large projects on transport infrastructure, energy infrastructure, and climate change response, especially in the Mekong Delta.
Agreeing with the Prime Minister's comments, Minister Ahmed Hussen emphasized that Vietnam is a priority partner of Canada and plays an important role in the country's Indo-Pacific Strategy.
He highly appreciated the position and role of Vietnam as well as the role of the Vietnamese community in Canada, the number of Vietnamese students is increasing and Vietnam is one of the countries with the most students in this country; the people of the two countries are always very close and share.
The Minister said that on the basis of strong relations, Canada wishes to continuously consolidate and enhance trust between the two sides, cooperate closely with Vietnam both bilaterally and multilaterally, and support Vietnam in achieving its development goals, for a strong, independent, self-reliant, and prosperous Vietnam.
He proposed promoting ODA cooperation focusing on a number of priority areas, especially education, climate change response, emission reduction, energy transition, etc. Appreciating Vietnam's commitment and efforts in climate change response and emission reduction, the Minister hoped that Vietnam would support and participate in Canada's "Global Carbon Pricing Challenge" (GCPC) initiative.
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