OREANDA-NEWS. October 07, 2011. Possibility of establishing a free trade zone between Ukraine and the Socialist Republic of Vietnam was discussed during a meeting in Kiev, by Prime Ministers of both countries Mykola Azarov and Nguyen Tan Dzung.

"During negotiations we discussed the possibility of establishing a free trade zone between our countries" - the Head of Ukrainian Government said at a joint press conference with Prime Minister of Vietnam.

According to him attention was paid to facilitate mutual trade procedures. Ukraine and Vietnam have also agreed to accelerate the work of the bilateral intergovernmental commission and to establish joint ventures in energy, agriculture and mining industries.

Mykola Azarov noted that intensification of bilateral cooperation will contribute to implementation direct flights between Kyiv and Hanoi in December of this year.

"Today we have also agreed with Prime Minister of Vietnam to make concrete efforts to give new impetus to the development of our trade and economic relations" - he said.

In turn, Prime Minister of Vietnam said that bilateral relations are developing dynamically, but not yet fully meet the potential of the two countries. According to him, the parties will make maximum efforts to double the turnover in 2012. "Our cooperation in recent years developed very rapidly, but the scale has not matched the potential of our countries. We agreed that we must strengthen cooperation and to double our turnover next year" - Nguyen Tan Dzung said.

In addition, he stressed that the parties agreed to revive cooperation in agriculture. In this context, it has been agreed to sign soon an intergovernmental protocol on quarantine of plants and an agreement on recognition of conformity as Agrarian products.

During the meeting, it was talked about cooperation in education. In particular, the Prime Minister of Ukraine to promise to increase the number of scholarships for students from Vietnam. "We agreed that Ukraine will increase the number of scholarships for students of Vietnam" - Mykola Azarov said.