This marks Prime Minister Petr Fiala's first trip to Asia since he took office at the end of 2021 and the first visit by the head of the Czech Government to Vietnam in 15 years. The visit aims to deepen bilateral economic, trade and investment cooperation, bringing the traditional friendship between the two countries to a new stage.
Vietnam and the Czech Republic established diplomatic relations on February 2, 1950. Since then, the long-standing friendship and multifaceted cooperation between the two countries have developed actively. The mutual trust and understanding between the two countries have been further enhanced through maintaining high-level delegation exchanges and cooperation mechanisms. Recently, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh met with Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala on the sidelines of the ASEAN-EU Summit (December 2022). Previously, in August 2021, the Prime Ministers of the two countries held phone talks.
The two countries have signed 14 cooperation agreements in many fields including economy, trade, investment promotion and protection, air transportation, and avoidance of double taxation.
In addition, the two countries have always promoted close coordination at international and regional multilateral forums. The Czech Republic supported Vietnam's candidacy for non-permanent member of the United Nations Security Council for the 2020-2021 tenure and was also one of the first EU members to ratify the EU-Vietnam Free Trade Agreement (EVFTA) and the EU-Vietnam Investment Protection Agreement (EVIPA).
It is a pleasure to see that the economic cooperation between Vietnam and the Czech Republic has been developing strongly. However, the trade exchange between the two countries is not yet commensurate with the potential. Two-way trade turnover reached 848 million USD in 2022, up 15% over the previous year. The Czech Republic always considers Vietnam one of its priority partners for economic cooperation outside the European Union.
In terms of investment, the Czech Republic has 41 FDI projects in Vietnam with a total capital of 92 million USD, mainly in the processing, manufacturing, and mining industries. The investment cooperation areas of Czech’s strength are energy, locomotives - railway wagons, buses, trams, agricultural machinery, and irrigation equipment. Regarding development cooperation, the Czech Republic was the first Central European country to provide Vietnam with ODA, totalling about 20 million USD.
Cooperation in education and training is a potential development area between the two countries. The Czech Republic has helped train thousands of Vietnamese officials, engineers, and workers. The two sides strive to promote prestigious Czech universities to coordinate with Vietnamese higher education institutions on higher education from 1999 to 2014, with the Czech Government having granted a number of scholarships to students and researchers from Vietnam to study in the Czech Republic.
Cooperation in the field of labour is also a bright spot in the bilateral relationship. In the context of labour shortage, the Czech Republic has a demand of receiving Vietnamese workers with professional training and Czech language, especially in the medical field.
The Czech Republic has established a number of vocational training institutions to support Vietnamese workers to improve their skills in many fields, such as mechanical engineering and the automobile industry, towards supplementing skilled workforces for Czech enterprises. The two sides also agreed to further strengthen cooperation in the fields of agriculture, science and technology, environment, climate change response, energy, culture, tourism, justice, and law.
The Vietnamese community in the Czech Republic currently has around 100,000 people, who are making many positive contributions to the development of bilateral relations. The Czech government highly appreciated and creates favourable conditions for the Vietnamese to reside and do business in accordance with the law of the host country. Since July 2013, the Czech Government has decided to add representatives of Vietnamese-Czech community to the Council of Ethnic Minorities, thereby recognising the existence of Vietnamese Czechs as an ethnic minority in the Czech Republic.
With long-standing and extensive cooperation in all fields, the official visit by Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala to Vietnam proves the respect and desire of the two countries’ leaders strengthen bilateral relations.
The visit aims to deepen bilateral economic, trade and investment cooperation, creating conditions for businesses of the two countries to approach and learn about each other's markets, potentials, needs and strengths. During the visit, the two sides are expected to identify specific cooperation directions in the fields of economy, trade, investment, and effective implementation of the EVFTA.
