Australian Ambassador to Vietnam Allaster Cox talks to a disabled resident of Kon Tum

Thanh Nien Weekly speaks to Australian Ambassador to Vietnam, Allaster Cox, about his views on the two countries’ bilateral relations.

Thanh Nien: Could you describe the current cooperation between Vietnam and Australia?

Cox: The current state of the bilateral relationship between the two countries and governments is very good.

Some aspects of bilateral trade have been affected by the economic crisis, especially due to decline in the value and volume of oil exported to Australia from Vietnam, but services trade, including student numbers going to Australia (now over 16, 000) and tourist numbers coming to Vietnam (over 200,000) have held up very well or have even grown. Australia is the only one out of 30 OECD developed nations to have shown positive growth in the first two quarters of 2009.

Australia has also recognized Vietnam’s market economy status under the new Australia-New Zealand ASEAN FTA, signed in February 2009, due to enter into force early in 2010.

On aid, Australia will commit A$106 million (US$88 million) in aid to Vietnam this year.

Our Vice Chief of Defense Force General Hurley has just visited Vietnam and had useful talks on deepening our defense cooperation. Also, Vice Minister Toan and his delegation from the Ministry of Public Security have just visited Australia to discuss important areas of immigration and police cooperation, including prevention of people smuggling and narcotics trafficking.

Regarding trade, the business delegation that traveled to Vietnam for the recent Joint Trade and Economic Cooperation Committee, with Trade Minister Simon Crean, gives you a very good idea of the areas of major interest. They covered infrastructure planning and development, mining, oil and gas, education and training, financial services and agribusiness.

Australian businesses are keen to develop investment, trade or service relationships in all these areas because they are areas where Australia has strong comparative advantage, geographic proximity to Vietnam and our companies recognize Vietnam as a growing potential market, with a young dynamic market.

Vietnam signed some agreements with Australia during Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung’s visit to your country in 2008. Could you please tell us how those agreements work now?

Actually, the two prime ministers, Mr. Dung and Mr. Rudd witnessed two important outcomes. First the granting of the ANZ Bank license. Since then, ANZ has been expanding its operations with new branches in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City. The other agreement was an agreement of the Transfer of Prisoners – an important agreement that will allow both sides to send back prisoners to serve out their jail terms in their home country. That agreement is still going through ratification process in Australia. It should enter into force soon.

How about cooperation between Vietnam and Australia in the time ahead?

Last year the two prime ministers agreed that Australia and Vietnam should forge a comprehensive partnership between the two countries. I think that in the period ahead we should see intensified cooperation in areas like defense and security, science and technology, further development of education relations, expansion of links in fighting transnational crime. I also hope we can work together more on economic reforms and trade and investment liberalization. I also want to sustain the strong links in agricultural research and agricultural development, as well as on climate change – a very important area for cooking security and for Vietnam’s future.

Could you comment on the Vietnamese economy and its ability to recover after the current recession?

Vietnam has been doing a good job in facing the crisis, despite significant impacts on the external sector. The government moved quickly to put in place an appropriate stimulus package and interest rates came down quickly. That has helped stimulate domestic demand especially as prices of key commodities like building products started to fall.

The government and State Bank of Vietnam have a very important task now to balance fiscal policy, monetary and exchange rate policy. We wish them well in this task – it’s been difficult for all governments and central banks, including in Australia.

I was not here ten years ago, but from all I have learned since coming here, the lives of people generally in Vietnam have been massively transformed for the better. Poverty levels have been significantly reduced. Incomes have been raised. There has been a significant transformation. We congratulate the Party, government and people of Vietnam on these achievements – and encourage more reforms to advance to the next stage.

Reported by Bao Van