VCCI Needs to Enhance Business Support

Ahead of the sixth Congress of the Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry (VCCI), Vietnam Business Forum interviewed Mr Nguyen Van De, Member of the VCCI Executive Board and Chairman of Thanh Hoa Business Association, on VCCI’s role and position in supporting enterprises and business associations in Vietnam in general and businesses and in Thanh Hoa in particular. Pham Mai reports​​.

I appreciate VCCI’s position and role in supporting business associations in general and enterprises in particular.

VCCI has really gathered a large number of business associations, enterprises and entrepreneurs to stay under a common roof which strives to promote contributions to national social and economic development. VCCI has effectively applied State and Party policies and guidelines to the country’s business community. Besides, VCCI has proposed the State and the Government to issue business support policies, with a pinnacle being the Politburo’s Resolution 09/NQ-TW dated January 21, 2013 on promoting the roles of Vietnamese entrepreneurs. While the business community is facing numerous difficulties and challenges, VCCI has taken many practical solutions to business support like promoting investment and trade and expanding international economic cooperation ties.

 

Vietnam’s entry to the World Trade Organisation (WTO) has opened up many new favourable opportunities for enterprises to establish and develop. However, despite in great number, most Vietnamese enterprises have small, even tiny, scale and their competitiveness is quite weak at the time of entering the market. The number of enterprises increases sharply but their limited quality, scale and scope of operation leads to unsustainable existence and development.

 

In my opinion, one of the biggest drawbacks of Vietnamese enterprises in the process of international economic integration is small scale, limited capital, low competitiveness, simple product, and limited knowledge of business laws, especially international law. Corporate governance, investment strategy, brand building, and human resource training and development are also their weaknesses.

 

I think inspections, examinations and reviews of enterprises’ operations should be tightened in order to have the quickest and most timely regulatory solutions and policies. Besides, to survive and develop sustainably, enterprises must first and foremost build and assert their brand names on the market which are essentially built from their personnel development, prestige to customers, and corporate culture. To have a good name, they must have employees with good knowledge of laws and build civilised, professional and disciplined working environments rather than build expensive working places. Their products must have good quality, reasonable price and consumer acceptance. They must also educate their employees to accept difficulties and challenges, avoid arrogance after each success, add more effort after each failure, and team up with other staffs for the development of their companies.

 

Prolonged global and domestic economic slowdown has caused adverse impacts on operations of enterprises. The provincial government and competent agencies have adopted suitable policies and guidelines to support local enterprises to live through the tough time. Enterprises themselves have proactively promoted their internal resources, restructured operations, cut costs, streamlined management apparatuses, enhanced professional staffs and technical workers, improved product quality, deployed customer attraction policies, and intensified trade promotion activities.

 

In addition to protecting legitimate rights and interests of local businesses, the Thanh Hoa Business Association is also a bridge for the business community and regulatory agencies. Besides, the association has actively reviewed and captured in operating situations of businesses in each industry in order to propose the Provincial People’s Committee to apply best solutions to help them deal with difficulties. The association also organised training courses on corporate governance, legal knowledge building, competitiveness and product brand for enterprises. It also pays attention to honouring enterprises and entrepreneurs with outstanding performances and encouraging them to add more effort to pass through the current tough time.

 

The sixth VCCI’s Congress is coming. I only hope that the new members of the VCCI Executive Committee will inherit and promote outstanding achievements accomplished during the fifth tenure. However, the country has marked changes in each stage of economic, cultural and social development; therefore, there is a need to change thinking and method of operation to match the reality and benefit businesses more. To achieve this, the VCCI Executive Committee must have unanimity and solidarity, and promote dynamism, creativity, bravery and self-responsibility of each member. The committee needs to pay frequent field trips to grassroots units to grasp the actual operating status of local enterprises so as to have appropriate industry-specific and locality-specific proposals, recommendations and support policies for the business community. It needs to further strengthen and uplift the position and role of VCCI’s local branches to better support local enterprises to train employees, grasp legal business knowledge, seek markets, promote investment and export, and establish cooperative ties with foreign businesses. VCCI in general and the Executive Committee in particular need to perform the role of organising investment and trade promotion activities, promote the development of the Vietnamese business community, and stage successful integration into the world market and economy.