Late last year, the United Kingdom joined the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership. British Ambassador to Vietnam Iain Frew writes about cooperation prospects across various sectors.

British Ambassador to Vietnam Iain Frew

Accession for the UK for the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) is going to provide a boost to both of the UK and Vietnam as businesses see tariffs reduced in a number of areas faster and further, as we see greater opportunities for digital trade and for supply chains, value chains which operate between our countries and the other members.

There are many areas for further cooperation. On the education side, we already have a strong relationship on education between our countries. There are over 12,000 Vietnamese students studying in the UK, and we would love to welcome more. At the same time, we are delighted that so many British education institutions and universities are looking to Vietnam to build partnerships and to offer high-quality services and courses here.

We have seen a number of partnerships develop over the past year, including British University Vietnam and others, offering UK high-quality university level courses to Vietnamese students. Now the UK has the highest number of these partnerships of any country with Vietnam, but we want to see not just quantity, we want to see quality as well.

So we are going to see those partnerships deepen and make sure that not just those who are lucky enough to be able to study abroad can take advantage of this in the UK, but also those who cannot or choose not to travel abroad to study will have access and opportunity here in Vietnam, which is a very important and very large market for many of those institutions.

Boosting healthcare

We have also seen some positive elements on how we are working together on healthcare. This included a delegation of healthcare innovation professionals visiting the UK last year, learning about how our healthcare system is developing and how innovation is supported through universities, businesses, and healthcare providers.

As Vietnam’s population continues to become richer, its demographics continue to shift, and new diseases and healthcare challenges develop, both the private and public sector are having an increasing focus on these issues. So this year we are going to continue to support that path of healthcare innovation.

Vietnam is becoming a place where it is not just British companies selling pharmaceuticals and medicines here in Vietnam, but is developing manufacturing in this sector. It is part of the chain of research, testing and clinical trials that all help to support healthcare innovation, as well as bringing new therapies and treatments to Vietnamese patients and consumers. So I think that is a very exciting area.

Additionally, we are hoping to support Ho Chi Minh City to develop a healthcare innovation hub together with the city of Liverpool and some important institutions such as the Oxford University Clinical Research Unit, based in Ho Chi Minh City.

Cementing tech cooperation

Both Vietnam and the UK have set out ambitious plans for how we are going to take advantage of the technologies of the future, whether that is AI, quantum, bioengineering, etc. These are all areas that, at this stage, are relatively small parts of our economies, but we can see huge potential for how these become important parts of our economic development. We are going to work together really closely on how we build those technologies, how we deploy them, and how we support innovation and entrepreneurs in these areas.

Recently we saw the first edition of the UK Southeast Asia Tech Week, and the second edition will take place at the end of March. That will bring together a range of innovators and businesses coming from the UK to Vietnam, with a focus on AI this year. They will share their expertise and make connections with Vietnamese partners to look at how we can continue to develop the sector between the two countries, alongside a range of other technology opportunities and financing. That has a lot of potential for the year ahead, and I think when we see that milestone in March, we are going to see a lot more develop from that and afterwards.

It would be remiss of me not to mention as well some of the ways in which we’re working together in defence and security. At the end of last year, we participated in the Hanoi Defence Expo, a huge and incredibly impressive event, as well as a celebration of 80 years of Vietnam’s army.

The question of how Vietnam continues to develop its security partnerships, and how it continues to diversify and modernise its defence, is an area where the UK and Vietnam are going to be working closely together. We have seen already through ship visits, through the UK Pavilion at the Defence Expo, and the cooperation between our defence ministries, that there is a lot more that we can do to support Vietnam’s modernisation, its security, and its resilience, as well as partner internationally, for example in UN peacekeeping. We are going to be doing all of that and more.

Intensified agriculture ties

Meanwhile, Vietnam’s agriculture exports have seen British consumers benefit from exports of seafood, which you can find in UK supermarkets – from pomelos and dragon fruit to rice and coffee, all of which are increasing volumes to the UK. The UK is also one of the top 10 markets for Vietnam’s cashew exports, so British consumers benefit hugely from this.

Alongside that, we are seeing increasing export of UK agricultural products to Vietnam, whether that be pork and poultry products, seafood, and whisky, as well as others which are growing their market share, like British cheese, chocolate, and confectionery.

These are all areas that we want to see develop further, and we have already seen some progress so far. Our free trade agreement (FTA), CPTPP, provides a really strong basis for these sectors to go further and faster in the future.

The UK government has announced a big investment and a commitment to building on the potential of AI within our country, but also with international partners, and I want to see us do that together with Vietnam.

But we need to be both committed to the benefits and aware of some of the challenges that are brought by AI, whether that is existing businesses, communities, online safety, and to the broader international frameworks that we operate in. We need to work together to take advantage of that sector and update our regulation, our framework, as we do so.

Another example is in data. Data flows are vital to our economies, and we have to keep data flowing freely, but securely. And those are things we must keep carefully in balance, and I look forward to continuing discussions with Vietnamese lawmakers and regulators about how new laws on data are being applied and how that is affecting businesses. It is necessary to keep a close eye on that, as we do with our frameworks in the UK, modernising them where necessary, and taking advantage of making available opportunities to our consumers and our businesses.

Recommendations

The basis of the trade agreements is also one in which Vietnam consistently sends messages around being an open and predictable trading environment, and that is a message delivered through agreeing on FTAs, but is also about making sure that we keep sectors and markets open and continuing to follow those rules.

For Vietnam to further promote investment and trading relations with the UK, especially when it comes to improvements for businesses of both countries to foster cooperation and utilise the CPTPP, we will work together with the Vietnamese government through our annual trade dialogues and our committees regulating our FTA to ensure that there is a level playing field and an open playing field.

But I am very heartened by the positive message that Vietnam continues to send on open trade, at a time when some countries are doubting commitments internationally to open and free trade, as well as the benefits it brings our consumers and our countries. Our two countries are very committed to those benefits, so that’s something that we should both continue to stay committed to.

At the same time, we need to see both countries continue to benefit from increasing trade and increasing prosperity through modernisation and development of our regulatory frameworks, whether that is around the energy sector, the consumer sector, or new technologies.

We need to build the frameworks to ensure that new technologies are fully regulated, and that we allow businesses and entrepreneurs to take the greatest advantage of the opportunities that are there. And we need to make sure that those technologies develop, and AI is a brilliant example of something we need to pay very close attention to.