More Vietnamese companies have planned to invest in African countries, seeing them as lucrative markets for their projects, said a representative from the Vietnamese Ministry of Industry and Trade at a recent trade promotion conference held in Hanoi.
Speaking at the conference on trade promotion between Vietnam and Africa held in Hanoi on July 6, deputy head of the West Africa and Southwest Asia Markets Department under the Ministry of Industry and Trade Hoang Huu Nhuan, said that many African countries are focusing on infrastructure development, which offered a big opportunity for Vietnamese investors.
Viettel worker is installing telecom infrastructure in Africa
Africa has huge import demand for food, agricultural, seafood and consumer products that Vietnam was capable of providing.
According to the Ministry of Planning and Investment, by the end of 2013, Vietnamese companies invested around USD730 million in 18 projects in 11 African countries. The projects are mostly concentrated on petroleum exploration, agro-forestry-fisheries processing, construction material production and telecommunications services.
Among those, the military-run telecom group Viettel is Vietnam's biggest investor in Africa with its projects in Mozambique, Cameroon and Tanzania. It is followed by PetroVietnam.
At the conference, PR Manager of Viettel Nguyen Ha Thanh said that the rate of mobile phone users in Africa remains low, which provides a good chance for Viettel and many other telecom investors. Just one month after the Viettel project in Tanzania became operational; the group had attracted one million customers in the country.
Thanh also noted that Viettel's projects in African have generated 3,000 direct jobs and 300,000 indirect jobs in the continent.
Thai Kieu Huong, vice president of the Vietnam-Africa-Middle East Business Forum, said Africa is a potential growth market but Vietnamese firms have little knowledge about it, so doing business there is risky.
The Vietnamese government needs to hire African experts to support local companies in setting up a contingent of consultants on trade and investment laws when doing business in Africa as well as seeking markets and partners, Huong suggested.
“It is also essential to form a network of banks to help Vietnamese companies which invest in Africa", Huong emphasised.
