Nordic businessmen in Vietnam shared a sense of positive business developments when they earlier this year met in Hanoi for the Annual General Meeting of Nordcham – the Nordic Chambers of Commerce in Vietnam.
“I believe we can say that most of the issues for our businesses today look better and more promising than one year ago,” Mr. Preben Hjortlund noted with satisfaction in his annual report to the members.
“When we met last year most of us felt that Vietnam was on the right track. Many new rules and regulations had been introduced, but I recall that many of us still had difficulties in selling Vietnam to our respective Headquarters,” he said.
“I am sure that most of us can only be successful if Vietnam is successful, so we will do our utmost to help the more positive organizations in Vietnam be successful in their struggle against the old regime,” Mr. Hjortlund added.
The meeting was held at the Melia Hotel in Hanoi on May 30, 2002. Representatives from 25 Norcham members attended the meeting.
Elaborating on the positive development for companies doing business in Vietnam, Mr. Hjortlund pointed among others to the increasing number of private enterprises.
“The Private Sector Development in Vietnam has really taken steam and the number the number of private enterprises have more than doubled since last year to 70,000,” he said, adding that with the domestic economy flourishing the development perspective for Vietnam was very promising.
With the outside world traditionally being slow to react on the upturn, the number of members of the Chamber had, however been declining, Mr. Hjortlund noted with regret. Some Nordic companies had closed down and a few who had opened up had not been able to fill the gap. For the companies who had stayed put in Vietnam it was, however, a point of satisfaction that the Nordic trade and investment numbers for Vietnam had remained rather stable over the period.
Mr. Preben Hjortlund – in his private capacity a Danish businessman with more than ten years experience on doing business in Vietnam – also recalled the many interesting member activities organized during the past year. Apart from a range of high level business meetings, the more social events were the annual Crayfish Party in September, two Networking Evenings, the Christmas Lunch with guest speaker Mr. Andrew Steer, Director of World Bank in Vietnam, an evening with Statoil and a meeting with Mr. Hans Skov Christensen of DI – Confederation of Danish Industries.
After the AGM, Mr. Jan Ahlsen, Business Development Offcicer of IKEA presented the success story of IKEA in South East Asia with particular emphasis on Vietnam.
Finally all participants joined a reception after the meeting where the members had a chance to exchange views with the many Vietnamese guests
