Three memoranda of understanding on real estate projects were signed between project owners and foreign investors at Viet Nam Investment Conference 2006 in Ha Noi yesterday.

Entitled "Riding on the High Growth of Viet Nam", the conference, organised by the International Investment and Urban Development Joint Stock Company (IDJ), introduced 68 investment projects including office buildings, high-end apartments, resorts, industrial zones and urban zones.

Delivering the opening speech at the conference, Deputy Minister of Planning and Investment (MPI) Cao Viet Sinh said that the promotion of foreign investment in Viet Nam - combined with improvements to the market economy mechanism and the legal framework for investment and business - played a vital role in Viet Nam’s efforts to advance its international integration.

IDJ Director Tran Trong Hieu stressed that the conference’s purpose was to encourage foreign investors and overseas Vietnamese to further invest in Viet Nam, especially in the real estate sector.

Hieu added that the real estate industry was drawing a lot of interest from foreign investors, while local project owners were short of cash to develop.

This was a major opportunity for enterprises to introduce their projects to nearly 200 domestic investors, as well as foreign investors from the US, Singapore, Hong Kong, Taiwan, South Korea and Malaysia, he said.

For investors, the conference was a chance to not only choose projects to invest in, but also to receive the latest information on Viet Nam’s investment policies.

At the conference, Pham Manh Dung, Director of the MPI’s Legal Department, summarised new regulations in the Investment Law that applied to foreign investors.

Ngai KT Roi, General Director of Malaysia’s Prima Line Horizon, said investors had been awaiting the changes in Viet Nam’s Investment Law for a long time, and that with these changes, investment flow into Viet Nam would be likely to increase.

The most prominent change is that the Investment Law has freed up access to the investment market, allowing investors access to all economic sectors. However, investment restrictions on 14 economic sectors still apply to foreign investors, which are consistent with WTO commitments and bilateral agreements. Apart from these 14 areas, foreign investors can make investments without legislative restrictions.

The new law has expanded investment forms available to foreign investors to include limited liability, partnership, joint-stock or private companies.

The previous Foreign Investment Law allowed foreign investment to take only three forms, namely wholly foreign-invested enterprises, joint ventures, and Business Co-operation Contract (BCC).

Requirements on minimum capital for a project and the ratio between legal capital and investment capital have been removed so that investors have more autonomy in mobilising capital.

In addition, trade measures and investment-related barriers have also been removed to comply with international agreements on opening the investment market that Viet Nam has joined.

The Investment Law guarantees that investors’ assets will not be appropriated and confiscated. Investors’ profit remittance and intellectual property rights are also assured.

Administrative procedures have been reformed to create more favourable conditions for investors. For example, in line with the increased decentralisation process, local authorities are now permitted to grant licences to all investment projects regardless of their scale and capital.

Under the law’s new regulations, investment incentives are decided on the basis of the sectors and locations of the investments, and are applicable to both domestic and foreign investors without any discrimination.

Edwina Baniqued