Bangladesh will invite more Vietnamese investment during the Joint Trade Committee (JTC) meeting to be held in Hanoi next month.
The Vietnamese government sent a letter to the ministry of commerce (MoC) recently with a proposal to hold a JTC meeting between the commerce ministries of the two countries on December 26-27, officials said.
"We received a letter from the Vietnamese government in this regard. We are now working on it," a top official of the MoC told the FE.
At the meeting, the Bangladesh side will discuss ways to explore more business opportunities with Vietnam, aiming to expand bilateral trade and investment, he said.
The Bangladesh delegation will also request Vietnamese investors to invest in the telecommunications and ICT sectors, he added .
Vietnam is now doing well in telecommunications and some other sectors, according to the sector insiders.
Goldman Sachs has put Bangladesh and Vietnam in the list of the 'Next Eleven' emerging economies, because both the countries have macroeconomic stability, political stability, and liberal trade and investment policies.
As per official data, the turnover of bilateral trade between Vietnam and Bangladesh has now reached US$527.8 million.
Both the countries expect to increase their bilateral import and export trade volume to the tune of US $1.0 billion by 2020, according to the sector insiders.
The trade relations between the two countries have witnessed many positive changes in recent years.
"Bangladesh has a lot of scope to attract Vietnamese investment. Vietnamese entrepreneurs could invest in the country's telecommunications and ICT sectors for the mutual benefits of the two countries," senior vice-president of the Federation of Bangladesh Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FBCCI) Montakim Ashraf told the FE.
He expressed the hope that the upcoming JTC meeting will offer both the countries opportunities to boost cooperation between the business communities of the two countries.
Bangladesh mainly exports agriculture products, leather and leather goods, jute and jute goods, textile, sesame seed, chemical products and knitwear to Vietnam and imports mineral products, textiles and textiles articles, clinker, cement, lime stone, steel billets, prepared foodstuffs, beverage and base metals from that country.
Bangladesh exported goods to the tune of 53.47 million to Vietnam and imported goods worth $ 492.43 million during fiscal year 2018-19, according to the FBCCI data.
