U.S. firms offered numerous recommendations to make Vietnam an attractive destination for foreign investment during their meeting with Vietnamese State President Vo Van Thuong in San Francisco on Wednesday (local time).

President Thuong is on a working visit to the United States through Friday to attend the APEC Economic Leaders’ Week and bilateral activities.

The meeting was attended by Ted Osius, president and CEO of the U.S.-ASEAN Business Council, and leaders of major enterprises active in various fields such as Apple, Boeing, BowerGroupAsia, Cargill, Chubb, Citi, East West Bank, FedEx, Google, KKR, Meta, Microsoft, Moody's, Pfizer, Procter & Gamble, PwC, UPS, Visa, Walmart, and Western Digital Corporation.

Vietnam was advised to ramp up its investment in local airports and infrastructure, and speeding up digital customs clearance.

Some American companies encouraged Vietnam to be more determined to bolster digitalization, one-touch payments, state spending management, and healthcare.

Speaking at the meeting, President Thuong said that Vietnam is striving to improve its investment climate and create favorable conditions for foreign firms, especially U.S. companies.

He also underscored that it is time for American investors to expand their cooperation with Vietnamese firms, mainly in the innovation, infrastructure development, healthcare, and research fields, as Vietnam and the U.S. upgraded their ties to a comprehensive strategic partnership in September.

Vietnam always encourages investors to roll out community-driven programs that benefit women, children, as well as people in remote and mountainous areas, while the country is willing to collect opinions on policies from U.S. firms, he said.

He urged U.S. groups to sound out investment opportunities in Vietnamese localities to make the two countries’ partnership highly efficient.

Furthermore, he proposed that U.S. firms give voice to cooperation barriers facing Vietnam and the U.S..

In particular, he hoped that the U.S. will recognize the market economy status of Vietnam as soon as possible, and remove Vietnam from its watch list of semiconductor support.

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