The Prime Minister’s participation in the summit reaffirmed Vietnam’s policies to always attaches great importance to the GMS in particular and the regional cooperation mechanisms in general.
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Vietnamese Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh |
The GMS was established in 1992 as an initiative of the Asian Development Bank (ADB). The GMS Program is the most complete cooperation program that involves Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Thailand, Myanmar, and China’s Yunnan and Guangxi provinces.
The GMS’s goals is to create favorable conditions for mutually-beneficial economic development cooperation among regional countries, turning the Mekong sub-region into a fast-growing and prosperous region. So far, the GMS has conducted six summits and the latest one was the sixth GMS Summit in Hanoi in 2018.
From a region with poor, underdeveloped, and isolated countries, the GMS has become one of the fastest growing economies in the world with dynamic markets. Over the past 30 years, the sub-region cooperation has ceaselessly developed in both depth and width, affirming its own identity as a prestigious regional cooperation mechanism with the strategy of “Connectivity, Community and Competitiveness.”
Hundreds of projects with a total investment value of tens of billions of USD have been implemented in various fields from transport, energy and telecommunications to trade, agriculture and environment. Especially, transport is considered the fastest growing sector with the formation of the East-West Economic Corridor (EWEC), North-South Economic Corridor (NSEC) and Southern Economic Corridor (SEC). The achievements of GMS cooperation mechanism have proved the people's aspiration and determination to build a peaceful, prosperous and sustainable Mekong sub-region.
With a clear acknowledgement of the Mekong sub-region as a direct space of security and development, Vietnam has actively taken part in all regional cooperation mechanisms, join hands with other GMS member countries to build an effective working procedures, bring into play the strengths of the participating parties and meet the development demands of the region.
It is hoped that the seventh GMS Summit will bring more chances to enhance connection, accelerate cooperation in the realms of economy, trade and investment, as well as develop socio-economy of member states, contributing to dealing with common regional threats and bringing prosperity to the people. Vietnam, as an active member of GMS, will benefit from taking part in the summit and will contribute more to the regional peace, cooperation, and development.
Translated by Trung Thanh