At the 10^th session of the Da Nang People's Council in its 8^th tenure, the Director of the municipal Department of Planning and Investment, Mr Tran Van Son, reported that the first 6 months of this year saw fewer than expected new FDI projects in the city.  The main reasons are thought to be that fees in the central region are higher than those in the northern and southern regions, whilst the city’s infrastructure is not as attractive to foreign investors as that in other localities.  Meanwhile, some foreign investors find it difficult to implement administrative procedures, and the city has issued regulations to only select environmentally-friendly FDI projects.

Mr Son added that, over the 2013 - 2016 period, the focus is on increasing foreign investment promotion programmes to reach the target of 1.6 billion USD-worth of new FDI projects coming into the city.  In addition, he stressed the need to take initiatives to appeal for more potential foreign investors, especially from Japan and South Korea.  The city authorities will accelerate the construction of local high-tech and dedicated information technology industrial parks in order to appeal to more foreign investors.

Addressing the event, the Secretary of the municipal Party Committee, Mr Tran Tho, said that 2 Japanese investors had recently urged the local authorities to hasten the infrastructure development at the city’s Hi-tech Park so that they could put their money into this park in October.  The city leader also asked the municipal Department of Planning and Investment and the city’s Industrial Parks and Export Processing Zone Authority to ensure sufficient supplies of electricity and water at the zone.