Vietnam licensed 18 overseas investment projects with total registered capital of over 287.3 million U.S. dollars in the first eight months of this year, according to a local agency on Wednesday.

Of the 18 projects, one involves in exploring and exploiting oil and gas in Singapore with investment of 21.9 million dollars, and another growing cash crops in Laos with registered capital of more than 12.5 million dollars, said the Foreign Investment Department under the Ministry of Planning and Investment.

To facilitate overseas investment, Vietnam has permitted foreign-invested enterprises (FIEs) to invest abroad more freely with adequate legal grounds. Under a recent governmental decree, which is a set of revised legal documents providing guidelines for Vietnam's overseas investment, both Vietnamese enterprises and FIEs no longer fall under the case-by-case consideration by the prime minister, except several cases.

The new decree stipulates that investors in Vietnam, including both domestic and foreign-invested enterprises, can apply for overseas investment at the ministry for most cases, and should be awarded an investment certificate within 30 days since the applying date.

Vietnam, which had total investment of over 367 million dollars abroad in 2005, mainly in Laos, Russia, Cambodia and Indonesia, is expected to annually invest 200 million dollars abroad between 2006 and 2010, the department noted.

To date, Vietnam has had 184 operational overseas investment projects with combined registered capital of over 920 million dollars in nearly 40 countries and regions. Laos has attracted most of the Vietnamese investment abroad.

Source: Xinhua