The bilateral trade between Bangladesh and Vietnam should reach $2.0 billion rationalising the trade gap through mutual cooperation, exchange of business delegation, and joint research.
Vietnamese investors should take the dividend of our existing competitive trade and investment ambiance in the form of investment, joint ventures, and technology transfer in agro-processing, shipbuilding, electronics, textile, pharmaceuticals, leather, jute, ceramics, light-engineering industries, Economic zones, and hi-tech parks.
Dhaka Chamber of Commerce and Industry (DCCI) President Rizwan Rahman expressed his views and came up with a call at a business networking meeting and B2B match-making between the DCCI and the visiting 31-member business delegation from Viet Nam held at DCCI on Tuesday.
Do Quoc Hung, Deputy Director General, Ministry of Industry & Trade of Vietnam is leading the Vietnamese business delegation to Bangladesh. Pham Viet Chien, Ambassador, Embassy of Vietnam in Bangladesh was also present during the meeting.
Mr Rizwan Rahman during the meeting also said Bangladesh and Viet Nam have been growing remarkably in recent decades taking initiatives to strengthen economic cooperation in recent years.
The bilateral trade between Bangladesh and Vietnam reached $739.89 million in FY2021 where export of Bangladesh was $61.29 million and import was $678.6 million, he stated.
To ensure a win-win trade relationship, Bangladesh can be included as a member of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) and ASEAN, Rizwan added.
Ambassador of Vietnam in Bangladesh Pham Viet Chien said Bangladesh is a potential business partner of Viet Nam.
Even in the post-pandemic era, the bilateral relation between Bangladesh and Viet Nam got much deeper, he said, adding that in the first nine months of this year the two-way trade crossed US$ 1.1 billion and it is growing day by day.
He hoped that the B2B arranged by Dhaka Chamber will pave the way to enhance linkages between the businessmen.
Chien invited Bangladeshi entrepreneurs to invest in Viet Nam and they are ready to share experiences and views with their Bangladeshi counterparts.
Do Quoc Hung, Deputy Director General, Ministry of Industry & Trade of Vietnam and Head of the delegation said lack of linkages between both parties is responsible for lower trade. He thus suggested more exchange of delegation.
He said Bangladesh and Viet Nam maintain a good inter-complementary trade relationship where both countries do not have to compete with each other.
Viet Nam has already implemented 15 Free Trade Agreements, he said, adding that the more we can arrange B2B, the more opportunity will be created for businesses.
DCCI Senior Vice President Arman Haque, and President of Bangladesh-Viet Nam Chamber of Commerce S M Rahman also spoke on the occasion. Later, about one hundred member companies of DCCI took part in an interactive B2B session with 31 visiting Vietnamese companies.