On November 20, the delegation has a meeting with Deputy Director General of the Ho Chi Minh City Branch of the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Vietnam and newly appointed Ambassador of Vietnam to Russia. According to Tatarstan President, there is great potential for the development of relations with Vietnamese companies in such areas as oil refining and petrochemical industry, digital technology, pharmaceuticals, medicine, agriculture and others. “I am sure that Tatarstan will contribute to strengthening cooperation between Russia and Vietnam,” Minnikhanov stated. Deputy Director General of the Ho Chi Minh City Branch of the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Vietnam reminded that the agreement on cooperation between the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Vietnam and the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Tatarstan was signed in 2014. “We want that Vietnamese companies develop their businesses in Tatarstan, and are interested in seeing your businessmen in our city. I hope that we will succeed in implementing a number of joint projects in the near future,” he said.

Later on, the delegation took part in the Vietnam – Tatarstan business forum. Consul General of the Russian Federation in Ho Chi Minh Alexey Popov and Vice Chairman of the Ho Chi Minh City's People's Committee Le Thanh Liem were also present at the forum. Welcoming the Vietnamese colleagues, Minnikhanov noted that Tatarstan attaches great importance to the development of cooperation with the Socialist Republic of Vietnam as part of Russia-Vietnam relations. “Russia and Vietnam are old friends. This was again confirmed by the meeting of the Presidents of Russia and Vietnam during the APEC Summit held in Da Nang. Thanks to their intensive joint work, the comprehensive strategic partnership relations are filled with practical content in many areas,” Tatarstan President said. “We are grateful to the leaders of our countries for their attention paid to the creation of favorable conditions for expanding interregional cooperation. In its turn, Tatarstan is ready to contribute to the development of business ties,” he continued. According to Minnikhanov, high-tech products made in Tatarstan, inluding KAMAZ trucks, Zelenodolsk Shipyard and Mi-17 helicopters, are well known in Vietnam. “In general, there is great potential for developing ties with Vietnamese companies in such areas as oil refining and petrochemicals, power engineering, machine building, automotive industry and production of car components, IT and other high technology, medicine and pharmaceutical industry, agriculture and others,” Tatarstan President said. According to him, cooperation in the scientific and educational sphere has great potential. A representative office of the Kazan National Research Technological University was opened at the partner university in the city of Viet Tri in 2014. A number of other universities in the republic maintain ties with Vietnamese partners. “A lot of foreign students study at our universities. Over 80 students and post-graduate students are from Vietnam. We will be glad to increase their number,” Minnikhanov addressed the forum participants. “We have experience of cooperation in the field of culture as well”, he continued. “About 600 Vietnamese live in our region. They established their national cultural society – Doanket at the Assembly of the Peoples of Tatarstan and regularly hold their national holidays, events, promote the rapprochement of peoples living in Russia and strengthening interethnic friendship,” Minnikhanov added.

Later on, the delegation had a meeting with Vice Chairman of the Ho Chi Minh City's People's Committee Le Thanh Liem. Speaking at the meeting, Minnikhanov thanked the leadership of Ho Chi Minh City for the high level of organization of the visit of the Tatarstan delegation. He stressed that Tatarstan is interested in strengthening mutually beneficial cooperation with Vietnam as part of Russian-Vietnamese relations. The development of ties with Ho Chi Minh is of particular interest, Tatarstan President added. “Ho Chi Minh City is Vietnam's largest city in terms of population, financial and economic potential, an important scientific and cultural centre. The city attracts a significant share of the country’s foreign investments,” Minnikhanov stressed. He noted that the leaders of Russia and Vietnam have set the task to bring the volume of mutual trade to 20 billion US dollars by 2020. “The leaders of our countries have set a very serious and challenging task. We need to work hard to achieve these indicators. Tatarstan is ready to contribute to the development of trade relations,” Tatarstan President said. In his turn, Le Thanh Liem thanked Tatarstan President for the visit. He noted that Ho Chi Minh is open to foreign partners and investors. The development of high-tech branches of industry, the sphere of information technology is the priority, he said. Then, the meeting discussed issues of further strengthening of close cooperation through new spheres and forms of interaction in various fields.

Later on, the delegation visited the Saigon Hi-Tech Park (SHTP), which has leading positions among other scientific and technical centres of the country. The park, covering an area of 913 hectares, was established in 2002 and is one of three hi-tech parks operating in Vietnam. It features a special area for doing research, development and application of new technology, as well as a business incubator for high-tech enterprises, the training of personnel and production of high-tech products. Such large high-tech companies as Intel (USA), Samsung (South Korea), Nidec (Japan), Sanofi (France), Datalogic (Italy), Microchip (USA), Sonion (Denmark) and others have chosen SHTP. In total, more than 70 projects are being implemented in various areas, including microelectronics, information technology, automation, nanotechnology, biotechnology and a number of others. As noted at the meeting, the total revenue of the park’s residents has made 15 billion US dollars this year. The task has been set is to increase this amount by 30 per cent by 2020. There is a research and development centre, which cooperates with the world's leading universities, in the park. Minnikhanov appreciated the scale and potential for the development of this special zone in Ho Chi Minh City. Tatarstan also attaches great importance to the development of information and communication technology and innovations, he noted. “This is a good platform for our cooperation. We could achieve good results in the field of IT technology, software products, the digital economy. You have managed to attract world leading companies, which is very important for further work with investors,” Tatarstan President said. For more focused work, Minnikhanov suggested developing a cooperation agreement to set out the main areas of interaction.

On November 21, Dr. Sergey Yushko visited Viet Tri University of Industry and had a meeting with its Rector – Dr. Vu Dinh Ngo and administration. In the framework of his visit to Viet Tri University of Industry Dr. Sergey Yushko met with the Director of the KNRTU representative office in Vietnam – Dr. Quan Dinh Khoa to discuss the issues of the representative office operation and development.

Later on, Dr. Sergey Yushko had a meeting with the Director of the Russian Center for Science and Culture in Vietnam – Nataliya Shaphinskaya in Hanoi. The issues of collaboration between KNRTU and educational and research institutions of Vietnam were discussed during the meeting.

President of the Republic of Tatarstan - official web site