official development assistance

Vietnam is one of a few countries to receive France’s three financial assistance channels: official development assistance (ODA), preferential loans from the French Development Agency (AFD), and soft loans from the Priority Solidarity Fund (FSP). Vietnam is now the seventh largest recipient of French ODA. So far, Vietnam has been granted Euro 1.2 billion through more than 210 projects.

The Vietnam-France cooperation has been focusing on four fields, namely legal and political reform assistance, education system modernization and research programme assistance, economic restructure assistance, and poverty reduction and social welfare improvement by participation in community healthcare.

2. Trade relations

In recent years, the two-way trade revenue has increased 10-15 per cent a year, making France one of Vietnam’s top trading partners in Western Europe. In 2005, Vietnam earned over Euro 1 billion from exports to France for the first time in the total of Euro 1.5 billion bilateral trade turnover. In 2006, the bilateral trade turnover grew by 10 per cent, reaching Euro 1.6 billion.

3. Direct investment

France ranks first among European countries and ranks ninth out of 77 countries and territories investing in Vietnam. As of May 2007, France invested US$2.25 billion in 179 effective projects in Vietnam. Of the sum, more than 50% of the capital was already disbursed, higher than the average FDI disbursement ratio of 40 per cent in the country. France-invested projects mainly focus on industrial fields, transportation and telecommunications”

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