Quang conveyed the best wishes from President Vo Van Thuong and other Vietnamese leaders to the Canadian Governor General, as well as their desires to further promote the comprehensive partnership between the two countries established in 2017.
He noted Canada is one of Vietnam’s most important partners, and the second largest trading partner, after the US, in the Americas, while Vietnam serves as the gateway for Canada to Southeast Asia and the Asia-Pacific region.
Currently, Vietnam is Canada’s leading trading partner in ASEAN and its sixth largest trading partner among the group of 40 Indo-Pacific countries.
The diplomat recalled the increasingly profound and effective development of the Vietnam – Canada Comprehensive Partnership in recent times, especially in 2023 when the two countries are organizing a range of activities to celebrate 50 years of their diplomatic relations.
Since the beginning of the year, Vietnamese Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau have met twice on the sidelines of summits in Japan in May and in Indonesia in September. During these meetings, the two leaders expressed his impression of the good progress in the Vietnam – Canada Comprehensive Partnership, in which trade cooperation is a bright spot with two-way trade turnover reaching over US$7 billion last year. The two sides also agreed to strive to raise bilateral the figure to US$10 billion soon.
The Ambassador stressed the need for the two countries to further promote the comprehensive partnership in the fields of politics – diplomacy and defense – security through maintaining regular high-level visits and holding existing cooperation mechanisms.
Vietnam supports Canada’s implementation of the Indo-Pacific strategy and strategic partnership with ASEAN, especially in the fields of economics, trade, investment and development cooperation, he said.
Quang went on to say Vietnam is ready to welcome a Canadian ministerial delegation to visit Vietnam in 2024 to explore and promote cooperation opportunities, especially in the areas of Canadian strengths, such as energy transition, digital transformation, green transformation, innovation, as well as in sharing experiences in technology and governance, improving institutions and especially training high-quality human resources.
He also expressed his wish that the Canadian government create favourable conditions for Vietnamese businesses and further open its market for Vietnamese goods, especially agricultural and aquatic products.
The Ambassador also expressed his desire to promote cultural, sports, tourism, people-to-people exchanges, and local cooperation between the two countries.
Governor General of Canada Mary Jeannie May Simon congratulated Ambassador Pham Vinh Quang on his new working term in Canada, and expected that the diplomat would make contributions to the increasingly effective and substantive development of the Vietnam-Canada Comprehensive Partnership in the coming years.
She noted with satisfaction the positive development of Canada-Vietnam relations, believing that both countries would continue to strengthen cooperation and coordination in addressing regional and global issues such as climate change.
Canada, a multi-ethnic country like Vietnam, wants to strengthen cultural cooperation and people-to-people exchanges with Vietnam, she said.