China and Vietnam should focus on improving infrastructure in the two corridors involving two southwestern Chinese cities and four northern Vietnamese localities, Chinese ambassador to Vietnam said in Lao Cai Province on Sunday at an international seminar attended by the Chinese and the Vietnamese representatives.

At the seminar, entitled "measures to develop Vietnam-China two economic corridors and one belt in new contexts", the Chinese ambassador Hu Qianwen proposed that the two sides should regard areas along the roads and railways in the two corridors, and ports and logistics services in the Beibu gulf economic belt as major points for bilateral cooperation on trade and investment.

China has improved and constructed necessary infrastructure networks in the two corridors very well, he said, adding that it is most important for the two sides, especially Vietnam, to improve transport systems.

At the one-day seminar, representatives from Vietnamese ministries and research institutes stated that the two sides should center on seeking funds and human resources to facilitate the construction of the two corridors and the belt, especially their infrastructure networks.

"Most important measure is speeding up cooperation on building socioeconomic infrastructure, including expressways, rail routes, seaports, power plants, telecommunications networks, wastewater treatment plants, and infrastructure of border areas," Nguyen Ba An, vice director of the Development Strategy Institute under the Ministry of Planning and Investment, said, adding that the two sides should prioritize construction of expressways of Kunming-LaoCai-Hanoi-Hai Phong, and Nanning-Lang Son-Hanoi-Hai Phong.

In May 2004, the governments of China and Vietnam agreed to develop the two economic corridors, and the Beibu Gulf economic belt involving China's Guangxi, Guangdong, Hainan, Hong Kong and Macao, and 10 coastal localities of Vietnam, to speed up socioeconomic development of the involved cities and provinces, as well as their trade and economic ties with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.

(Xinhua News Agency December 3, 2007)