U.S. enterprises regarded Viet Nam as the top target market among of ASEAN member states for business expansion and investment in 2017.
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The USChamber ofCommercerecently published a survey on business prospects in 2017 in ASEAN member states.
The survey found positive prospects and abundant trade opportunities for American businesses in ASEAN.
Accordingly, 53% of respondents replied that ASEAN markets becamemore important for them over the last two years. Up to 78% of businesses expected for higher revenues in 2017and 49% planned to expand their labor force in ASEAN at the end of 2016.
A majority of respondents (87%) forecast higher trade transactions and investment in the next five years.
Noticeably, up to 40% of American businesses responded that Viet Nam took the lead in ASEAN for market expansion and investment; followed by Indonesia, Myanmar, Thailand, and the Philippines.
Viet Nam also led other ASEAN member states in FDI attraction from American businesses which intended to withdraw from China in the next two years.
Respondents praised Viet Nam’s advantages such as competitive labor costs (65%); individual security (65%); stable political system (64%); infrastructure (61%); and stability of the legal system (54%).
Almost all business managers said that the domestic business and investment environment was improved significantly.
However, they also pointed out weaknesses including corruption (71%) and the lack of guaranteeing from local authorities(46%).
Up to 50% of respondents said that the regional integration positively influenced performance of American businesses there.
Over a half of respondents responded that the Trans-Pacific Partnership affected their investment plans in Viet Nam in particular and ASEAN in general./.