For a Powerful Vietnam

As part of activities to celebrate Vietnam Entrepreneurs Day, October 13, and the 75th anniversary Uncle Ho sending a letter to the business community, the Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry (VCCI) held a “Party and Entrepreneurs" dialogue on entrepreneurs’ mission to build a powerful country and their proposals to the Party in Hanoi on October 9, chaired by VCCI President Vu Tien Loc. Vietnam Business Forum would like to excerpt some opinions of entrepreneurs on this topic.

Mr. Pham Dinh Doan - Chairman of the Vietnam Enterprise and Family Council (VEFC), Chairman of Phu Thai Group

We wish, through today's forum, to send a message that the Party and the Government need to trust the Vietnamese business community because their resilience is enormous. Our entrepreneurs are ambitious and bold. I hope that the Party and the Government will quickly improve the investment environment, transparency and institutions as much as possible.
In the past time, VCCI has put forth a lot of recommendations, some of which have been adopted by the Government. VCCI has played a very important part in uplifting entrepreneurship. The 21st century is the era of cooperation and unity of the business community. Therefore, I hope that enterprises and business associations will work closer together. In the future, VCCI will continue to be a broad common home to the business community where they gather and cooperate with each other for development in all contexts.

Mr. Nguyen Manh Than - Chairman of Phu Tho Business Association

Over the past 75 years, the Party and the Government have actively improved business policies and businesspeople have worked hard for today's successes. While some are successful, a majority of Vietnamese companies still face difficulties. Given unfavorable global fluctuations, we must continue development by restructuring and changing product markets.
Currently, some legal documents are not updated soon enough to keep up with actual requirements, thus producing great impacts on business operations. The Party and the Government need to care about institutions, facilitate the business community to clear difficulties in the way, starting from the revision of overlapping and inappropriate regulations to adopting very specific transparent and fair mechanisms to the entire business community. For the time being, capital support, technology and favorable procedures are what companies need for product and market restructuring.
We hope and believe that, after the 13th National Party Congress, many innovations will be made to create a new appropriate institution that fits international integration trends and meets legitimate requirements of the entrepreneur force and the business community to lay a solid foundation for building a powerful country in all aspects to meet expectations of the people, entrepreneurs and enterprises.

Mr. Ho Minh Hoang, Chairman of Deo Ca Group

The COVID-19 pandemic has partly indicated the position of Vietnam on the world map. To join forces to build the economy and deal with epidemic consequences, nothing is more practical than completing ongoing projects and putting them into operation as scheduled or committed to fulfill the goal of having rich people, a strong country, an equitable, democratic and modern society, as the Party has set a guideline for our actions and efforts to achieve.
With the “Focused growth” strategy which aims at environmentally friendly projects when it masters road traffic construction technology, from now to the end of 2020, Deo Ca Group will complete and put into operation Hai Van 2 Tunnel, open traffic on Trung Luong - My Thuan Expressway, optimize the production force to take on such projects as Dong Dang-Tra Linh Expressway in Cao Bang province, two Cua Luc bridges in Quang Ninh province, and eastern traffic corridors.
Placed itself in the general context of the country and the world to survive, compete and develop, Deo Ca Group proposed specific actions. The first action is to actively, directly give opinions and ideas to the Government to form a suitable investment environment in the future, with proposals drawn from practical developments to create a good legal corridor for business development. The second is to expand cooperation and experience and responsibility sharing to create the right supply chains to minimize intangible costs. The third is to review and optimize processes and production forces and identify weaknesses to change for better.
Over the past years, the Party and the Government have dealt with a series of negative issues, consolidated public confidence, and created a new dynamic force for legitimate businesses. I expect and believe that the Party will select the next generation of visionary and innovative leaders.

Mr. Nguyen Huu Thap - Chairman of the Tuyen Quang Business Association

Since the 6th National Party Congress, our Party has adopted new reforms. Since then, the private economy has continuously developed and so have Vietnamese entrepreneurs.
Toward the 13th National Party Congress, I expect and believe that the Congress will continue to see the private economic force as an important driving force for the country's economic development and as a backbone of the domestic economy. Then, it will make right and appropriate decisions in the new context that suit practical domestic and international situations and match the needs and development capacity of the business community, especially the private sector and small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).
However, over the past time, when businesses have faced a lot of difficulties in several decisions and regulations. Therefore, we think that we need to increase the participation of such organizations as VCCI or the Vietnam Fatherland Front in institutional reform and include legislative tasks to subordinated professional bodies. I also propose strengthening the role of the Ministry of Justice and relevant bodies and assigning legislative work to justice divisions of ministries, rather than the agencies which are responsible for administering affairs subject to be governed by new rules.

Mr. Nguyen Duc Cay - Chairman of the Board of Directors of Constrexim Housing Development Investment Joint Stock Company

To help businesses and entrepreneurs with inclusive development, some changes need to be made:
Firstly, on mechanism and policy, it is recommended that the Party pay special attention to consistency of mechanisms and policies on management institutions to eliminate overlapping circulars and decrees issued by ministries and central agencies as soon as possible.
Secondly, we hope that the Party and the Government will, by all means, thoroughly handle bureaucratic harassment and corruption in the public agencies from central to local levels.

Mr. Pham Van The - Chairman of the Quang Ninh Business Association

Vietnamese entrepreneurs hope that the 13th National Party Congress will accelerate the second reform wave, create an ecosystem for the boom of innovative entrepreneurs. For a mighty Vietnam, right from now, we need to shape the face of the Vietnamese entrepreneur force for the next 25-30 years with many policy recommendations below.
First, the Government should continue to study and perfect market economy institutions, transparently publicize socioeconomic development plans and orientations and support policies; and provide businesses of all economic sectors with equal access to development resources. It needs to study and improve laws on business ownership and rights, create a legal environment for fair and equal competition, eliminate business privileges; further reform administrative procedures, ensure public service agencies and executors to support and accompany businesspeople; develop and implement dialogue and consultation mechanisms for businesspeople for lawmaking and policymaking.
Second, it needs to introduce measures to support entrepreneurs to join the official business sector, expand the operating scale and performance of their businesses, focus on developing entrepreneurship in rural areas; encourage business mergers and acquisitions and apply appropriate measures to rapidly increase medium-sized enterprises; accelerate the formation and development of large-scale enterprises capable of leading and supporting SMEs to deeply join global supply chains.
Third, the Government needs to create fundamental changes in training and fostering entrepreneurs; develop and implement national programs on entrepreneurship training toward international standards; uphold business culture and social responsibility of entrepreneurs, build harmonious labor relations, protect the environment and pursue sustainable development.
Fourth, it also needs to promote the role of business representative organizations, guide and support the establishment and cooperation of business associations; collect and reflect aspirations, opinions and recommendations of businesspeople, advise the Party and the State on socioeconomic policies; implement measures to uphold business and entrepreneurship development.
Fifth, the Party's leadership of entrepreneur development is necessarily enhanced. It is necessary to develop and implement entrepreneur development strategies; institutionalize Party policies on entrepreneurs with specific action programs; and increase entrepreneur representation in political agencies.

Source: Vietnam Business Forum