A destination for cooperation and investment

Cần Thơ is a type-I municipality and the economic, financial, cultural and tourist centre of the whole Mekong Delta. Recently, Cần Thơ CIty has focused on investing in the urban infrastructure, which has been and will be developed synchronously. The city belongs to the top places acquiring the highest information technology and telecommunication application indexes in the country.

So as to attract more investment, during the past years, Cần Thơ has been relentlessly making efforts to improve the business environment, enhance the competition capacity so that more and more domestic and international investors would be attracted to come to discover and invest. Thanks to the investment promotion meetings, high-level conferences at the national and international scale, the images of the land, people and ideal environment for investment in the Mekong Delta have been introduced to all investors in the country and around the world. Many economic experts and investors show their good impression towards the positive trust index and the status of political security and social safety guaranteed to be stable at the highest level. "This is extremely significant because once the status of political security and social safety are ensured to be stable, the investors can feel carefree to offer their flow of capital to projects, which contributes to the socio-economic development of the city", says Mr. Trần Quốc Trung, the Secretary of Cần Thơ Party Committee.

Just from the first half of 2017 to that of 2018, a great number of big events and conferences were held in Cần Thơ City. The most typical one was "The APEC Week on Food Security and The High-level Dialogue on Enhancing Food Security and Sustainable Agriculture in Response to Climate Change," which took place from 18th to 25th of August 2017. This was a large-scale conference featuring 687 delegates, 462 of whom are foreigners, engaging in 33 activities. Moreover, “The Conference on Sustainable and Climate-resilient Development of the Mekong Delta” unfolding in two days from 26th to 27th of September 2017 in Cần Thơ City and presided by Prime Minister Nguyễn Xuân Phúc and Deputy Prime Ministers Vương Ðình Huệ and Trịnh Ðình Dũng attracted more than 800 delegates to participate. Among them, there were 54 foreign participants from 22 delegations such as representatives of the Consulates-General of the Netherlands, Germany, Japan, India, Denmark, Australia, the USA, Switzerland, and Sweden and 10 international organizations, etc. The latest was “The ASEM Conference on Climate Action to Achieving the Sustainable Development Goals - Ways Forward which occurred from 19th to 20th of June 2018 and was presided by Mr. Phạm Bình Minh, the Deputy Prime Minister and concurrently the Minister of Foreign Affairs. This conference was participated by delegations from 27 ASEM member countries and 7 international organizations.

Previously, the third “Vietnam - Japan Cultural and Commercial Exchange Event,” which happened from 3th to 5th of November 2017 in Cần Thơ City and featured a 40-member Japanese delegation led by the Japanese deputy-consul-general in Hồ Chí Minh City, finished with great success. As Mr. Trần Quốc Trung, the Secretary of Cần Thơ Party Committee, reported: "During three days of the event in Cần Thơ City, about 120 thousand visits and exchanges were recorded. Some organizations and businesses from South Korea, Singapore, Hong Kong (China), Israel, the UK and India came to seek business collaboration opportunities. Especially, Mr. Takahashi Ayumi, the Head of the Japanese Tourism Promotion Agency in Vietnam, expressed his impression about the potential to develop tourism in Cần Thơ as well as promised to inform and introduce Cần Thơ City to all Japanese Tourist Associations as a new destination in 2018."

Maintain political security and social order and safety

In order to acquire to the success of high-level conferences, big holidays and the stability of the central city of the Mekong Delta, missions of ensuring the political security and the social order and safety have always been put at top of the agenda by functional departments of Cần Thơ City. Mr. Trần Việt Trường, Head of Cần Thơ Propaganda and Training Commission, said that the party committee and people’s one of the city have oriented to establish a steering committee to ensure the political security and social order and safety in momentous political events, which would be headed by the director of Cần Thơ Public Security to cooperate with military and medical forces, etc. to make a working plan. Colonel Trần Ngọc Hạnh, the Director of Cần Thơ Public Security, said that depending on the agenda of every conference, the city’s public security will closely and promptly with other stakeholders to serve and ensure the comprehensive security and safety. Simultaneously, other forces would also be mobilized to maintain the political security, order and safety of the society; take good care of escorting leaders of the Party, the Government, foreign delegates as regulated in the codes of diplomacy; act proactively and avoid getting passive and astounded.

Recently, the status of political security and socio-economy across the country in general and in Cần Thơ particularly has got positive progress and achieved many crucial outcomes in most sections. However, hostile and rebellious forces keep increasing detrimental activities and incite people to stage demonstrations, create chaos and split the bond between the Party, the Government and the people. When the National Assembly was discussing two plans of the Special Administrative-Economic Unit (shortly known as Special Zone Law) and the Network Security Law, some bad subjects uploaded posts, shares and comments distorting these two laws, spreading information to encourage people to get engaged in demonstrations in some provinces and cities across the country. While the situation was getting more complicated on social media, Cần Thơ Public Security actively counselled the People’s Committee of the city to make plans to prevent and handle demonstrations, chaos in the area. Colonel Trần Ngọc Hạnh informed that they had appointed forces to get updated with the local status, protect important targets and at the same time, deployed professional methods to meet and communicate with more than 30 subjects in the area who usually posted updates and comments distorting the correct policies and orientations of the Party and the Government. After listening to the explanations, encouragement, they changed their minds and promised to pull down their untrue posts. Most of them admitted that they had not read the two laws but only heard of bad information on social media before sharing or commenting.

Besides, Cần Thơ Public Security also got the forces together, discovered promptly and tackle many extreme subjects who posted, shared and commented about demonstration and parade activities ruining the security and orders; held and maintained armed patrolling, controlled the area round the clock as well as employed many forces and methods to ensure the security in the area. "To attract big investors, foreign investors and tourists to Cần Thơ City, it is necessary to guarantee the political security and the social orders and safety so that anyone who comes here can feel worriless to invest, enjoy freely the poetic and peaceful beauty of a waterway area. Only in this way could we contribute to the success of the target “making tourism become the spearhead economic section of Cần Thơ City by 2020” as suggested in the Resolution of the Party Committee of the city, shared Colonel Trần Ngọc Hạnh.