(VOVWORLD) - Prime Minister of the Republic of Mozambique Agostino do Rossario began an official visit to Vietnam on Monday to strengthen bilateral traditional friendship and cooperation.
 A Viettel engineer discusses with Mozambique colleagues (Photo: Viettel)
|
Vietnam and Mozambique established diplomatic ties on June 25th, 1975, the day when Mozambique declared independence. The two countries have supported each other during past struggles for national liberation and current national development.
Mozambique is a major partner in Africa
Mozambique is a major Vietnamese partner in Africa. The two countries have boosted bilateral ties between the two Parties, States, and peoples. The Communist Party of Vietnam and the Mozambique Liberation Movement Party (Frelimo) have strengthened cooperation in personnel training and scientific research and shared experience in personnel management and improvement.
The two countries have accelerated bilateral trade cooperation. From 2006 to 2010, bilateral trade increased from 13.8 to 45.3 million USD. In 2016, two-way trade totaled 100 million USD. Mozambique was ranked 11th among 72 countries and territories that Vietnam has invested in. The Viettel Military Telecommunication Group and the Hapro trade group have promoted investment in Mozambique. Movitel, a joint venture of Vietnam and SPI has a total investment capital of 500 million USD, 70% of which was contributed by Viettel. Movitel has created an information revolution in Mozambique since it debuted in May, 2012.
Potential to boost bilateral cooperation
Mozambique’s ongoing economic reform is creating investment cooperation opportunities for Vietnam, especially in agriculture, fisheries, mining, civil industry, construction, energy and public infrastructure. Under an agricultural cooperation agreement signed in 2008, Vietnam helped Mozambique develop food crops to address food security problems.
Mozambique has great potential for producing cash crops like coconut, cotton, soybeans, and sugarcane, for which Vietnam has a great demand. Vietnam can also share with Mozambique its rice, maize, and sweet potato varieties.
To tap their cooperation potential, the two countries will continue to increase cooperation in telecommunications, health care, education, and mining, grant visa exemption for diplomatic and official passport holders, and make it easier to Vietnamese enterprises to invest in Mozambique.