Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc and his spouse will pay official visits to New Zealand from 12 - 14 March and Australia from 14 - 18 March.

Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc and his spouse will pay official visits to New Zealand from 12-14 March  and Australia from 14-18 March.— VNA/VNS Photo Thong Nhat

The visits will be made at the invitation of New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull.

In Australia, Phuc will attend the ASEAN-Australia Special Summit in Sydney.

Viet Nam and New Zealand set up diplomatic relations in 1975.  Viet Nam is New Zealand’s 16^th largest trade partner with the two-way trade hitting about 1.2 billion US$ in 2017.  The two nations aim to raise bilateral trade to 1.7 billion $ by 2020, making economic co-operation a pillar of their relationship.

Meanwhile, Viet Nam and Australia celebrated the 45^th anniversary of their diplomatic ties early this year.

The two nations are enjoying sound bilateral trade with average annual growth standing at 12.5 % and trade value hitting over 9 billion $ last year.  Australia has landed 378 projects valued at 1.7 billion $ in Viet Nam, focusing on industry and construction, services, education, processing industry and agro-forestry-fisheries sectors.

(Source: VNS)