Japanese Consul Ikuo Mizuki said the number of Japanese traveling to Vietnam and Japanese businesses investing in the country has been increasing steadily.

As of March this year, Japan had 1,048 investment projects operational in Vietnam, with a total registered investment capital of more than US$17 billion, making it the third biggest among 84 investors in the country, said Nguyen Cong Tanh, vice chairman of the Vietnam-Japan Friendship Association.

In related news, the Japanese Business Association of Ho Chi Minh City (JBAH) granted 90 scholarships worth VND2 million each to poor students with good academic records on Monday.

The “Vietnamese- Japanese Human Resources” scholarship for the academic year of 2009-2010 was presented to students from Ho Chi Minh City University of Technology and HCMC University of Social Sciences and Humanities.

The annual scholarship is part of a human resource training program co-founded in 2002 by the Vietnamese-Japanese Economic Committee, the Japan Economic Federation, and the Japanese Business Association in Vietnam.

Reported by Van Khoa