French and Vietnamese companies signed two trade agreements at the France – Viet Nam Business Forum held in HCM City yesterday to mark the visit of French President Francois Hollande.

Drug company Sanofi signed an agreement to extend and strengthen its partnership with Vinapharm. The new strategic partnership covers all locally manufactured medicines marketed by Sanofi in Viet Nam and products exported to countries in the Asia-Pacific region.

The agreement is expected to take effect by year-end subject to government approval.

Vinapharm will invest in Sanofi Vietnam Shareholding Company, which owns a new, good manufacturing practices-certified facility.

The US$75 million plant will not only produce 150 million batches of drugs per year but also be a centre of excellence in the Asian region. It constitutes Sanofi's largest investment in ASEAN member countries to date.

"Sanofi has been present in Viet Nam for more than 50 years and has achieved the number 1 position in the pharmaceutical sector," Philippe Luscan, the company's executive vice president, global industrial affairs, and president in France, said.

"This new agreement between Sanofi and Vinapharm will expand and enable easier access to healthcare for Vietnamese. This also reflects the strong economic and scientific relationship between France and Viet Nam in healthcare."

In the livestock sector, Neovia Viet Nam and their partners Grimaud Group and Le Boucher signed a partnership with the Animal Husbandry Association of Viet Nam to help improve quality set up a value chain to be called "Le Pork Du Mekong".

Amid a strong demand for food safety and traceability, this collective and responsible commitment will enable the development of a pork production control at all levels.

More deals on the way

At the forum, delegates agreed there is huge potential for companies from the two countries to expand co-operation, especially when a free trade agreement between Viet Nam and EU comes into effect in 2018.

French Minister of State for Commerce, Small-Scale Industry, Consumer Affairs and the Social and Solidarity Economy Martine Pinville said Viet Nam has the highest growth in the region.

Together with Singapore, it is the most open to foreign investors, she said, promising that France would walk hand-in-hand with Viet Nam during its development.

France would help Viet Nam wrap up the free trade agreement with EU after which co-operation between the two countries in many sectors like drugs, agriculture and food would become more convenient.

Nicolas Du Pasquier, president of the French Chamber of Commerce and Industry Viet Nam, said Viet Nam needs to revamp its banking sector as well as public services to optimise its potential and attract investors, including from France.

He said the country's dynamism has been evident since it began its "Doi Moi".

With average growth of over 6 per cent a year, a stable economy and a growing middle class, the country needs to develop sectors like transportation, healthcare, education, and food to have products of better quality, he said.

Nguyen Thanh Phong, chairman of the HCM City People's Committee, said the city's doors are always open to French investors.

The city's relations with France have strengthened year after year, he said.

As of July France had 185 projects in HCM City worth $848 million.

Trade between the city and France rose by 8.5 per cent last year to $746 million.

FPT, Telespazio to announce ties

FPT Corporation, the leading ICT Company of Viet Nam, and Telespazio France announced their strategic partnership in the EarthLab programme on Tuesday.

FPT and Telespazio France will customise and deliver services for the immediate benefit of the Vietnamese territory. FPT will supply cloud services and analytics for the collected data of the EarthLab Early Services in Viet Nam.

Initiated by Telespazio France and rooted in the expertise of the Telespazio Group in the space and geoinformation domains, EarthLab is the first world network of centers dedicated to environmental monitoring. The network is built of a community of partners (EarthLab Galaxy), bringing together institutional, industrial and scientific players to serve territories and their populations.

Using remote sensing technologies and the spread of digital tools, EarthLab's ambition is to contribute to the emergence of a development model involving economics, human and environmental parameters more closely. Based on the Earth observation satellites, EarthLab proposes a customised management of environment-related activities.

Viet Nam is willing to explore the founding of an EarthLab Vietnam, focused on activities such as rice monitoring, water management, climate change, and coastal surveillance. These are key economic domains for this country which are facing major impacts from climate change.

VNS