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Dr. Nguyen Si Dung, former Vice Chairman of the National Assembly Office, said that to fully tap the benefits of international integration, it is necessary to focus on further enhancing competitiveness, especially in terms of human resources. This includes making strong investments in education and training to improve skills and labour capacity, particularly in areas such as information technology, management, and foreign languages, he said.

Along with improving the infrastructure system, it is crucial to speed up institution reforms, improve the business environment, reduce administrative burdens, and perfect the legal system to create a transparent, fair, and favourable business climate for businesses, especially small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).

Besides, it is important to strengthen partnerships with countries and regions, actively participating in international economic forums, and improving the effectiveness of free trade agreement (FTA) implementation to expand markets and attract foreign investment, he said, stressing the need to roll out measures to protect the environment and minimise the impacts of climate change towards sustainable development.

Agreeing with Dung, Permanent Vice Chairman of the Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry Hoang Quang Phong said that the Vietnamese business community is sharing an increasingly close links with the international business community and business organisations, while Vietnam is connecting with 180 international trade promotion organisations and chambers of commerce, and is a member of various international and regional economic cooperation mechanisms and organisations.

This is a chance for Vietnamese businesses to increase their influence in the international arena, he held, but also said that the global consumption and investment situation has not yet recovered fully with signs of increasing protectionist barriers and trade defence measures, making it difficult for Vietnamese businesses to conduct investment activities.

The VCCI recently released the outcome of its survey revealing that only 32% of businesses said they plan to expand production and business in the next two years.

This figure is the second-lowest in the 18 years of VCCI surveys. However, some medium- and large-scale enterprises in key sectors of the economy, such as manufacturing technology, agriculture, forestry, and fisheries, still said they plan for expansion.

Businesses showed their expectation that the legal framework for business operations will be quickly revised and supplemented to suit the reality. It is important to establish channels for receiving feedback from businesses and to increase the accountability of policy-making agencies, they proposed.

From a research perspective, Nguyen Phuong Anh from MISA AMIS – a leading digital business management solution supplier, asserted that in order to make breakthroughs in sustainable development in the era of integration, businesses need to build comprehensive strategies, invest in innovation, enhance competitiveness, and focus on customers. Only by understanding trends and adapting flexibly can businesses fully capitalise on opportunities and overcome challenges during the integration process, she said.

Anh held that businesses need to focus on identifying key and target markets, while establishing mechanisms to adapt and remain flexible in response to market changes, improving their knowledge to understand and take advantage of tariff incentives to reduce costs and access new, larger markets, and strengthening their management capabilities and applying technology to achieve breakthroughs during the integration process./.