Mr. Nguyen Minh Triet noted that Vietnam’s Economy had gone from strand to strand in the first three quarters of this year, and it’s expected to expand by better-than-expected 5.2 per cent for the entire year.

“We should grasp the opportunity of the recovery to promote partnerships between Singapore and Vietnam,” he told about 350 business’s executives from Singapore and Vietnam at a lecture titled “Vietnam-Partnership for Progress”.

“You will enjoy great opportunities because of the excellent political relations between our two countries,” he said, adding that Vietnam hopes Singapore would continue to be its leading strategic partner in the region.

The lecture, organised by the Singapore Business Federation, was chaired by Senior Minister S. Jayakumar. Speaker of Parliament Abdullah Tarmugi and Minister of State for Trade and Industry Lee Yi Shyan also attended the lecture.

The President had begun on Monday a two-day state visit to Singapore, with his main focus on attracting investments.

While Vietnam is South-East Asia’s fastest-growing economy, it was not spared in the global downturn and growth slowed to 6.2 last year, the lowest in a decade.

Nonetheless, said Mr. Triet, with a population of 86million, the 13th largest in the world, Vietnam retains much potential for investors.

Singapore private education company, KinderWorld Group, is heeding his call.

It has set up 13 international schools across Vietnam since 2000 with about US$12 million (S$16.6 million), said Ms. Mary Xuan, who oversees KinderWorld’s Vietnam operations in the next five years, it plans to build up to 15 more, including a university, with another US$50 million to US$ 100 million, she said.

As of September, Singapore businesses had invested US$ 16.9 billion in Vietnam. Besides major players such as Keppel Land and SembCorp, the Singapore presence includes companies from sectors as diverse as constructions, healthcare, education, logistics and finance, according to IE Singapore.

Ms. Xuan attributed KinderWorld’s bullishness to the huge demand for quality education among the Vietnamese. A unified enterprise law introduced in 2005 that helped clarify the legal dos and don’ts for foreign investors, plus financial carrots offered by the government, have also helped.

Mr. Triet promised that his government would make Vietnam even more attractive by continuing to restructure and modernise the economy, while maintaining monetary policy and keeping inflation in check.

Vietnam is also working to be more integrated with the world economy, Mr. Triet said. It hopes to drawn “as soon as possible” the Trans-Pacific Strategic Economic Partnership Agreement (TPP), a free trade pact among Singapore, New Zealand, Brunei and Chile.

Speaking at the opening of yesterday’s lecture, Professor Jayakumar said Vietnam’s membership would “help position the TPP as a viable building block towards an eventual Free Trade Area of the Asia-Pacific”.

Yesterday, Mr. Triet had lunch with Singapore business honchos and visited the Botanic Gardens, where an orchid was named Spothoglottis Phong Chi in honour of him and his wife, Madam Tran Thi Kim Chi.

The guests visited the Ho Chi Minh’s Memorial Stele at the Asian Civilisations Museum before flying back to Hanoi in the evening.