Hanoi (VNA)♋ – Vietnam and the US recently held a ceremony to unveil the logo of the 25th founding anniversary of their diplomatic ties (July 2020), which also marks 25 years since the normalisation of bilateral diplomatic relations.

Twenty-five years ago, trade turnover between the two countries stood at only 450 million USD. Now, the figure surged 133-fold to 60 billion USD, making the US the third largest among more than 100 trade partners of Vietnam. Commenting on the rapidly growing trade relationship, US Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs David Stilwell said: “It is the result of hard work and the vision of many people on both sides who believed in the possibility of peace.” He said the US always prioritises promoting economic, trade and investment links, which hold the focal role and serve as an impetus for strengthening the countries’ comprehensive partnership. “US businesses are investing more and more capital in Vietnam while Vietnamese producers are sending more of their goods to enthusiastic American consumers,” the official noted. At the governmental level, in just more than one month, Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc welcomed US Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross, Chairman of the US-ASEAN Business Council Board of Directors Keith Williams, along with a number of US firms coming to explore cooperation and investment opportunities in Vietnam. Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross said many large enterprises of the US are very interested in the highly potential market of Vietnam. Statistics show that in 2018, Vietnam’s exports to the US increased by only 14.2 percent while the US’s shipments to the Southeast Asian nation soared 36.4 percent, turning Vietnam into the market to which the US’s exports grew at the fastest pace.

Efforts to narrow trade gap

Prior to the launch of a series of events celebrating 25 years of the countries’ relations, Bamboo Airways of Vietnam announced that it was preparing to receive and debut a wide-body Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner at Noi Bai International Airport. The plane is the first of the 10 wide-body aircraft to be delivered to Bamboo Airway under an agreement with Boeing that was signed in the presence of Party General Secretary and State President Nguyen Phu Trong and US President Donald Trump in February 2019. The move has turned Bamboo Airways into the first private airline to operate wide-body planes in Vietnam. Earlier, national flag carrier Vietnam Airlines put into use eight jets of this kind from August. US President Trump highly valued Vietnam’s signing of big contracts worth billions of USD with his country, which he said will help create more jobs for American people and provide high-quality equipment for Vietnam. Echoing the view, President of the US-ASEAN Business Council Alexander Feldman said large contracts like those on aircraft purchase are beneficial to trade relations between the two countries. Aside from the field of aviation, energy is also a potential sector for US businesses to step up investment in Vietnam as officials of the two sides have had frequent meetings to discuss this area. In terms of agricultural and food products like maize, soya bean, meat, milk and fruits, the US records a trade surplus of 400 million USD with Vietnam each year. Data of the Vietnamese Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development indicate that the North American nation has continued to post growth in the export of many commodities to Vietnam, including timber and wood products (up 24.1 percent), animal feed and materials (14.1 percent), aquatic products (85.9 percent), and fruits and vegetables (73.9 percent). Vu Ba Phu, Director of the Vietnam Trade Promotion Agency under the Ministry of Industry and Trade, said trade, economic and investment ties between the two countries are flourishing, becoming a driving force for their win-win relations./.