Provincial leader receives with Deputy US Ambassador

24/02/2020 13:38

(BNP) – In the morning of February 21st, Mr. Nguyen Van Phong, Vice Chairman of Provincial People’s Committee received and worked with Mrs. Caryn R. McClelland, Deputy US Ambassador in Vietnam. Welcoming the delegation were leaders of Provincial People's Committee Office; Department of Planning and Investment; Department of Industry and Trade; Provincial Industrial Zones Authority; Association of Small and Medium Enterprises (SME).

Vice Chairman Nguyen Van Phong presents souvenir products to Mrs. Caryn R. McClelland.

At the reception, Mrs. Caryn R. McClelland said that the Office of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) was established in Hanoi in 2000. Until now, there are many projects supporting Vietnam with programs including governance and economic growth; education, environment, global health, humanitarian and so on. Among which, the project "USAID Linkages for Small and Medium Enterprises" (USAID LinkSME) is funded USD 22.1 million by USAID Vietnam and will be implemented in 5 years (2020 - 2025). The project aims to ameliorate the supply chain ecosystem for SMEs and improve the capacity of enterprise associations in supporting SMEs development. There are currently 9 SMEs in Bac Ninh province that assessed preliminary capacity to participate in the project.

She expressed her hope to cooperate with Bac Ninh province to promote the USAID LinkSME Project's development cooperation activities with enterprises in the province.

Welcoming the Deputy US Ambassador to Bac Ninh, Vice Chairman of Provincial People’s Committee Nguyen Van Phong briefed on the outstanding achievements in the socio-economic development of the province in recent years. In spite of being the smallest province in the country, thanks to favorable location and incentive investment policies, Bac Ninh has been one of the provinces with fastest growing speed with many indicators ranking on top of the country such as size of the economy, industrial production value, FDI attraction, export turnover, revenue import per capita ... Up to now, Bac Ninh has attracted more than 1,500 FDI projects with a total registered capital of over USD 19 billion with many enterprises and large corporations from 37 countries and territories worldwide, of which, there are 11 investment projects of US enterprises.

In the coming time, the Vice Chairman hoped that the two sides will have cooperation to expand activities to support supply and demand and the technical support with an aim to improving competitiveness and integrating into supply chains for enterprises in the province, focusing on the province's priority products in the fields of electronics, mechanical engineering, and high-tech industry.

The Vice Chairman of Provincial People's Committee assigned Department of Planning and Investment, Provincial Industrial Zones Authority, Department of Industry and Trade to support information related to SME support policies, the province’s industrial development policies, activities to connect supply and demand ... to USAID Office, thereby, effectively implementing USAID LinkSME project in the province.