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Tan Tao to speed up the development of Long An Province

Long An is a province in the Mekong Delta region of southern Vietnam and faces Ho Chi Minh city, the largest city in Vietnam, in the east. Inevitably, Ho Chi Minh City has had strong, positive impacts on the development of Long An.

During a working visit just a few days ago, President Nguyen Minh Triet has suggested that the Mekong delta and Long An province ought to focus on luring foreign investment and developing trade-services in conjunction with ensuring social welfare and sustainable economic growth.

The president also requested that Long An pay more attention to upgrading infrastructure, improving living standards, providing vocational training and generating jobs for local people, particularly those in remote and rural areas.

He urged the province to accelerate the construction of residential areas specially designed for flood prevention to ensure the safety of local people during the 2008 flood season.

Last year, Long An posted economic growth of 13.5 percent, helping to reduce the rate of poor households to 6.2 percent.

In the first quarter of this year, the province reported an economic growth 11.5 percent, 2.2 percent higher than the same period last year.

Located in the key southern economic region, Long An attracted 12 foreign-invested projects, bringing capital of some 85 million USD, in the first three months of this year.

The figures have brought the total amount of foreign-investment projects in the province to 209, valued at 2.28 billion USD.

According to the 2007-2008 economic development strategies, the Long An People‘s Committee set the target for economic growth in 2008 at 14.5% compared with the 2007. Also, the province plans to have a 30% increase in export and import turn-over and to create over 30,000 new jobs in 2008.

To implement those targets, four key factors have been selected by the provincial committee for the socio-economic development of Long An province.

Long An ‘s map Source: bcvt.gov.vn

Firstly, building ought to be concentrated on industrial parks so as to extend production services, and bring about a shift in the economic structure from the agricultural to the non-agricultural sector.

Secondly, concentrated residential regions should be developed in close connection with urban planning for an effective infrastructure and concomittant service structure.

Thirdly, development of the service infrastructure.

Fourthly, the opening of new markets and expansion of the market to Ho Chi Minh city in particular.

Economic development strategies of Ho Chi Minh city with the key Southern economic region.

Ho Chi Minh city‘s economic development strategies focus on the development of the key Southern economic region on the basis of promoting local development potential. Accordingly, high-end services and labor-intensive industries will be given priority for investment and development to help Long An quickly transform its economic structure. Ho Chi Minh city, as a larger city, will provide services and a large market for Long An‘s products.

Grasping the Government‘s policies of investment movement from Ho Chi Minh city to Long An province, Tan Tao Group has developed the Tan Duc Industrial Park and a modern residential area. The Industrial Park is located in Duc Hoa Ha commune, Duc Hoa district, Long An, 15 km from Tan Tao Industrial Park and 25 km from HCM city. This is the largest among the industrial parks of the Tan Tao Group with a total area of 1,159 hectares and VND 5 billion investment capital.

To achieve those services development goals of the Long An province and to attract more investment from HCM City and businesses in the Mekong Delta region, Dr Nguyen Tan Nguyen, Vice-Chairman of the Development Research Institute, suggested: “Senior officials of Long An need to focus on the implementation of socio-economic development plans, land planning; urban development planning designed for the development of commercial-service infrastructure and ensuring the objectiveness and stability of the approved plans and developing a synchronous traffic system. The industrial parks are required quickly to come into operation to ensure production platform for investors.”

Dr. Khuyen is a leading and prestigious specialist in agricultural economics and rural development in Mekong Delta region.