Đà Nẵng: PCI champion and top business attraction in VN

A corner of the central city of Đà Nẵng

Đà Nẵng has a strategic position in terms of economics and national defense. It is one of Việt Nam’s key transport hubs; the easternmost end of the East-West Economic Corridor; and the gateway to the sea for Laos, Cambodia, Thailand and Myanmar.

The city also has great tourism potentials as it lies near six UNESCO-recognized tangible and intangible cultural heritages, namely: Phong Nha-Kẻ Bàng National Park, Huế Citadel Complex, Nguyễn Dynasty’s Royal Music, Hội An Ancient Town, Mỹ Sơn Vestige Complex, and the Space of Gong Culture in the Central Highlands.

Besides, Đà Nẵng is a financial-banking cradle in Central Việt Nam, with over 50 branches of banks. This is also a major center of sports, education, and healthcare.

Fostering competitive advantages

The city introduced was also the first localities to drastically pursue administrative procedures reform by launching “one-stop-shop mechanism” since 2001 In favor of the business community.

Up to now, Đà Nẵng has 11,800 private enterprises with the total registered capital of VND 28.5 trillion and 164 FDI projects worth of US $2.62 billion. These new economic sectors have significantly created added values for the city’s sustainable economic growth.

Local residents and enterprises are regularly fed with legal information through mass media like websites, radio and newspapers.

Information relating to land management and planning are widely published for public opinion.

Laudably, the city’s leaders frequently join direct meetings with residents and investors to fine tune policies.

Apart from the Central Government’s policies, the local authorities have also adopted many incentives and preferential mechanisms to facilitate production and business activities.

Đà Nẵng is among the first localities to assist enterprises to find markets, partners, and technologies and promote trade.

Spreading out red carpet to talents

The city is paying great attention to nurturing human resource and bettering the population’s educational standards. Now, 47/56 communes of the city have fulfilled the universalization of junior secondary education.

By the end of 2009, the city had 5 universities, 9 colleges, and 48 vocational training centers. It is estimated that 46.5% of the city’s labor force got training.

Projects on training high-quality cadres, MAs, PhDs, and grassroots-level public servants are being deployed to upgrade the capacity of the public sector.

Đà Nẵng has issued preferential policies to attract talents to the city during the past 10 years.

Perfect infrastructure

With its already perfect system of international airport, deep-water seaports, national highways and railway, the city is speeding up some large-scale infrastructure projects, such as the Software Technology Center, to impulse its economic growth pace.

The city is also working with the Central Government to finalize transport projects in order to smooth socio-economic development.

Forming a modern ICT infrastructure

Đà Nẵng is one of Viêt Nam’s three post and telecommunication centers where the international marine cable line SE-ME-WE 3 goes ashore.

Its quality of ICT infrastructure is moving asymptotically to the developed world.

The city’s Software Technology Center is cooperating with Indian Aptech and Japanese AOTS to produce international-standard computer programmers and IT engineers. In this regard, Đà Nẵng was chosen by the National Steering Committee for ICT as the top among localities nationwide in terms of ICT Index 2009.