As part of their ongoing working trip to the United Kingdom, a group of Da Nang's leaders, led by municipal Party Committee Secretary Nguyen Xuan Anh, on Monday met with representatives from the Vietnamese Embassy in the UK, the Biwater Group, and Aston University.

Secretary Anh (6th right) and the Aston University representatives

During a reception for his  guests from Da Nang, the Vietnamese Ambassador to the UK and Northern Ireland, Nguyen Van Thao, highlighted the fruitful results from the bilateral diplomatic and economic relationships between Viet Nam and the UK. 

In particular, Viet Nam has to date attracted investments of over 4 billion USD from the UK, and 300,000 British people visited the country last year.  Currently, over 12,000 Vietnamese students are studying at UK universities.  Given the new freedoms after Brexit, several British companies now intend to promote their business activities in Viet Nam, with a particular focus on Da Nang which has great potential for the development of tourism and education.

In reply, Secretary Anh asked the Ambassador to help Da Nang advertise its attractive investment environment, and its tourism development potential, to British businesses.

In another meeting with some representatives from the Biwater Group, Secretary Anh highly praised the British group for their professional skills, experience and investment activities in Viet Nam.  He took the opportunity to appeal for the group to conduct research and offer their best technical and financial solutions for Da Nang’s wastewater treatment and environmental protection projects. 

The Biwater Group’s leader affirmed, “Viet Nam will receive between 1 and 2 billion USD from the UK in official development assistance (ODA) loans in the near future.  Therefore, Da Nang will have the opportunity to access this fund to implement its environmental projects.”

Over the past 5 decades, Biwater has focused on expanding the scale of its business activities and furthering its infrastructure and technologies in order to become one of Europe’s leading companies in the water industry.

During the period, Biwater has completed over 25,000 projects, in over 90 countries, in such aspects as wastewater treatment, water purification, and desalination.  In Viet Nam, the group built the Yen So wastewater treatment plant in Ha Noi.

During his meeting with some representatives from Aston University in Birmingham, Secretary Anh remarked that the implementation of the Viet Nam-UK University project in Da Nang will match with the development strategies of Da Nang University, and those of the city as a whole.  Da Nang is aiming to become the main centre in the central region and highlands for education and training, science and technology, and start-ups.  Therefore, the local authorities would assist any foreign businesses looking to invest into the city’s infrastructure and facilities. 

Secretary Anh added that he hoped Aston University would send its lecturers and transfer its advanced curricula to the soon-to-be-developed Viet Nam-UK University.

In response, Aston’s Director, Prof Alec Cameron, spoke highly of the potential of the project due to Viet Nam’s large population size, its stable economic growth, and its studious students.

Aston University has been ranked amongst the top 10 leading universities in the UK.  Over the past 3 years, it has established a cooperative relationship with the University of Da Nang in aspects such as electronics, telecommunications, biotechnology, finance, and accounting.