Opportunities on trade and investment co-operation between Vietnam and Japan was the theme of a seminar held on August 8th in Hanoi.

According to Ken Arakawa, senior advisor for JETRO, Vietnam and Japan share many cultural similarities. For Japanese, they regard Vietnam as the most similar closest country to them among ASEAN members. The Japanese government has also strongly supported relations with Vietnam. These are the foundation for the increasing investment from Japan to Vietnam as Japanese enterprises feel secure in investing into Vietnam.

Ken Arakawa also briefed local enterprises who attended the seminar on the taste of Japanese consumers in order to achieve success in doing business with Japanese.

Both Ken Arakawa and Odajima Tsuyoshi, director of Canon Vietnam’s Thang Long Factory emphasised that quality was one of the most important issue that Vietnamese businesses should take care of in order to achieve successful business with Japanese.

Odajima Tsuyoshi took Canon Vietnam as an example. Canon Vietnam currently employs a total of 13,000 workers and the company has to provide their workers with uniforms. As the number of workers increasing, the company has had to make orders for uniforms and the colour of these uniforms varies from each batch distributed. This is proved to be unacceptable and the company has had to select another supplier.

Odajima Tsuyoshi also urged local businesses to try other ways of calculating the price of their products. According to Odajima Tsuyoshi, Vietnamese businesses calculate the price of their products by totalling the costs of inputs, labour and their expected profit. This way of calculation should be changed. The price of products must be decided by clients. From the price accepted by customers, producers must think of measures so that that price can be profitable.

Canon Vietnam currently has 80 suppliers but only 11 are domestically-invested ones. Odajima Tsuyoshi said that Canon Vietnam would like to increase the number of domestic suppliers and would provide active technical support to those who wish to become Canon Vietnam’s suppliers.

Japan is currently one of Vietnam’s biggest trade partners. It is Vietnam’s second biggest export market. The country ranked third in terms of foreign investment capital in Vietnam but occupied the number one position in terms of disbursed capital. Currently, there are 735 valid Japan-invested projects in Vietnam with a total registered investment of US $7.4 billion.

The seminar was organised by the Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry (VCCI), the Vietnam-Japan Business Forum (VJBF), the Japan External Trade Organisation (JETRO) in Vietnam and the Japan Business Association in Vietnam (JBAV). (Nhan Dan Online)