On the afternoon of May 28, in Bangkok capital, General Secretary and President To Lam attended the Vietnam - Thailand Business Forum 2026.
Also attending were Thai Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul; high-level delegates from the two countries and representatives of the leadership of nearly 700 Vietnamese and Thai businesses.
Speaking at the forum, General Secretary and President To Lam shared that if political relations create a foundation for trust, economic cooperation must create development momentum; if the governments of the two countries pave the way, then businesses of the two countries must be the leading force, turning commitments into projects, turning potential into values, turning friendly relations into practical benefits for the people of the two countries.
Pointing out the development advantages of the two countries, General Secretary and President To Lam said that one side is strong in momentum, the other side is rich in experience and depth. If knowing how to connect these two advantages with a new vision, Vietnam and Thailand can jointly form supply chains, production and distribution centers, trade and service platforms and new growth drivers for both countries as well as for ASEAN.
General Secretary and President To Lam requested the business community of the two countries to focus on promoting the orientations: Together building the Vietnam - Thailand value chain in the ASEAN space. Cooperation between the two countries needs to go beyond ordinary goods exchange, towards joint production, joint processing, joint distribution and joint brand building.
Relying on complementary strengths in agriculture, food, consumer goods, retail, energy, tourism and services, the two sides can deepen production, e-commerce, green standards and traceability to jointly create new ASEAN-branded products, supply chains and values.
The two countries need to promote three connections (production connection; infrastructure connection; transformation connection) to form a complementary economic space between Vietnam and Thailand. These three connections will help Vietnam and Thailand go beyond ordinary market relations, forming two complementary links in ASEAN's new production, service and growth network.
Economic cooperation between the two countries must go deep into people's lives through tourism, services and digital finance. The two countries need to better connect air routes, joint tourist routes, retail, cuisine, culture, and education with cross-border QR payments, e-wallets, digital commerce and digital finance.
When Vietnamese tourists conveniently pay in Bangkok, Thai tourists easily shop in Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City, Da Nang or Phu Quoc, economic cooperation is no longer just orientations but goes into each transaction, each item and each specific business opportunity.
General Secretary and President To Lam proposed that after the forum, the two sides should soon build a list of priority projects for the 2026-2030 period on logistics, agriculture, food, clean energy, digital commerce, tourism and human resource training to turn the cooperation vision into concrete results.
General Secretary and President To Lam hopes that businesses of the two countries will enter a new cooperation program with a long-term vision, creative thinking and higher development responsibility. Vietnam-Thailand cooperation needs to be measured by specific projects, new technologies, new jobs, products with higher added value and more practical contributions to the people.
