On October 29th 2021, representatives of Hai Phong Department of Foreign Affairs participated in the online meeting “Vietnam – the Netherlands Logistics: Identify opportunities and partnership connection” co-hosted by Vietnam Embassy at the Netherlands and Vietnam Ministry of Trade and Commerce with participation of more than 200 delegates from relevant departments and cities of Vietnam.
At the connection point of the Vietnam Embassy in the Netherlands, Online meeting on Vietnam – the Netherlands Logistics on October 29th 2021. Photo: Department of Foreign Affairs
After welcome speech of Vietnam Ambassador at the Netherlands and opening speech of representative of Import-Export Department (Ministry of Trade and Commerce), the meeting was twofold: i)current logistics master plan and demand for logistics service development at Vietnam, Dutch experiences and solutions in planning and constructing logistic facilities; ii)practice of logistics management and human resource at Vietnam, measures and suggestions from the Netherlands.The meeting aimed to identify opportunities and partnership connection between Vietnam and the Netherlands, and to boost chances for cooperation between the two sides in logistics.
High-quality human resource in logistics plays a key role in logistic capacity enhancement. Photo: Department of Foreign Affairs.
Since Vietnam became an official member of WTO, Vietnam’s economy has been growing and has become one of the opening economies in the world. In 2019, commercial turnover reached over $500 billion and has continuously increased. During the early 09 months of 2021, despite COVID-19 impacts, import-export turnover has grown more than 24%, e-commerce has increased over 32%. Plus, Vietnam approved 15 FTAs, in which many were new generation FTAs (such as CPTPP, EVFTA, RCEP) that have facilitated growth in international trade activities as well as infiltrated markets across the world. To add, increasing demands in e-commerce have stimulated expansion demand for logistic services in Vietnam. Currently, the logistics industry of Vietnam has grown 14-16%. Number of logistic services were diverse with storage service, transportation, etc. That is one of Vietnam Government’s attempts’ achievements in business environment reform, institutional reform, simplification of administrative procedures, competitiveness enhancement of Vietnamese enterprises. According to Vietnam Strategy on logistic services development by 2025, the Central Government identified 06 main duties, in which infrastructure development, improvement of services quality, human resource development were crucial. Among those 6 duties, 3 duties were topics for discussion among speakers, delegates of cities and provinces of Vietnam, and representatives of big enterprises and academics at the meeting.
As a gate to Europe, the Netherlands has been one of logistic hubs in the area with interlacing industries. Owning leading and modern ports, airports, and roads systems globally, the Netherlands has been pioneering in logistics, with many big companies with experiences in logistics. According to the logistics performance index published by the WB, the Netherlands has continuously kept a leading position among logistics high-performance countries. Within strengths regarding infrastructure and high-skilled labors in logistics, the Netherlands has been considered the second biggest logistic services provider in the world. Indeed, Schiphol airport of the Netherlands has connected to 333 destinations across the world, getting ranked the third biggest position in terms of passengers and the forth one in terms of goods transmission in the Europe; Rotterdam port of the Netherlands has been the biggest in the world, carrying inter-Europe multimodal transportation, quickly and conveniently connecting with West European industrial centers and big economies. Thanks to high quality human resource, in which 10% has been working in logistics, Dutch strengths have been used in implementing synchronous, integrated, and hightech applicable measures, and made balance between development and natural environment. The Netherlands has been developing models of organization, connection, thinking, masterplanning, and operation towards integration, comprehensiveness, optimizaton, and sustainability in construction, operation, and development of quality logistic services, and contributing to national eco-social development.
Connecting points at different locations at the online meeting on Vietnam – the Netherlands Logistics on October 28th, 2021. Photo: Department of Foreign Affairs.
In deep integration to the regional and global economy, economic development focusing on exports has been one of strategically privileged targets in Vietnam. Logistics development has been one of effective tools so that Vietnam would integrate into global goods and value supply chains. Go over almost 50 years since Dutch-Vietnamese diplomatic relation establishment, cooperation between the Netherlands and Vietnam has been growing in various fields. Understanding logistics development demands of Vietnam, Dutch strong points and experiences in logistic services development, enhance cooperation between Vietnam and the Netherlands in logistics would be beneficial to both sides./.