Growth momentum from processing and manufacturing industries

Industrial production plays a leading role in the country’s development. Along with attracting major global investors to build manufacturing plants, Vietnam is gradually adopting a more selective approach to investment attraction, creating favorable conditions for domestic enterprises to participate in production supply chains with foreign-invested partners, thereby fostering a more autonomous and sustainable industrial sector.

Dong Nai enterprises’ products displayed at the Trade Connectivity Conference organized by the Provincial People’s Committee in 2025.

Attractiveness to foreign investment

Despite global uncertainties, Vietnam has remained an important destination for foreign direct investment (FDI) enterprises and multinational corporations in recent years. In particular, the processing and manufacturing sector continues to strongly attract FDI inflows. In 2025, total registered FDI in Vietnam reached approximately US$38.42 billion, of which the processing and manufacturing industry accounted for US$21 billion, representing 54.7 percent.

Amid shifts in the global economic landscape, supply chains worldwide are undergoing restructuring, and Vietnam is widely regarded as one of the countries with notable advantages. These advantages include political stability, a steadily improving investment environment, competitive production costs, a plentiful workforce and broad access to international markets through a network of new-generation free trade agreements. As a result, the country is gradually emerging as an important manufacturing and export hub in the region and beyond.

Many countries and territories worldwide with advanced manufacturing technologies such as Singapore, Japan, South Korea, China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, the United States and several European countries have stepped up investment in Vietnam’s processing and manufacturing industries. In Dong Nai, according to Vice Chairwoman of the Provincial People’s Committee Nguyen Thi Hoang, the province’s 43 operating industrial parks (IPs) have attracted investors from 51 countries and territories, with more than 2,200 projects totaling over US$43.4 billion in registered capital. These projects primarily focus on sectors including electronics, electrical equipment, precision mechanics, textiles and garments, food processing and chemicals. More recently, investment has increasingly targeted high-tech and environmentally friendly industries.

Many FDI enterprises are also planning to expand their investment scale. Fan Guofeng, General Director of AQUA Vietnam Electrical Appliances Co., Ltd. in Bien Hoa 2 IP, said that after 30 years of operation, the company has formulated a long-term development strategy, extending its investment operations until 2045. AQUA plans to increase its total production capacity to nearly 1.6 million products per year, including about 800,000 washing machines and 800,000 refrigerators annually, enabling the company to meet growing demand in the domestic market as well as export markets across Asia, Europe and other regions.

Alongside its appeal to major FDI enterprises, Dong Nai has also attracted thousands of domestic companies engaged in industrial production and manufacturing. However, most local enterprises are small and medium-sized, and the business community hopes to receive greater support from the government in strengthening connections and supplying components and supporting products to FDI partners more extensively.

Driving force for sustainable growth

The processing and manufacturing industry not only contributes a large share to GDP, export turnover and state budget revenue, but also generates significant spillover effects for related sectors such as services, logistics and construction.

According to the General Statistics Office, the added value of the industrial sector in 2025 rose by 8.8 percent compared with the previous year, contributing 35.15 percent to the overall growth of the economy’s total added value. Within the sector, processing and manufacturing expanded by 9.97 percent, marking the highest growth rate during the 2019–2025 period.

In Dong Nai, processing and manufacturing remains the province’s core industrial pillar, recording growth of 10.2 percent in 2025. During the first two months of 2026, industrial production continued to show positive momentum. The Index of Industrial Production (IIP) in the January–February period increased by 13.85 percent year on year. Processing and manufacturing remained the main growth driver, accounting for a significant share of the overall increase in industrial production. According to Cao Dang Vien, Head of the Dong Nai Statistics Office, enterprises in the province are actively seeking and expanding markets to create new growth opportunities. After the Lunar New Year holiday, many companies resumed production to fulfill early-year orders and compensate for the extended holiday break.

As a major industrial province, Dong Nai continues to create favorable conditions for both domestic and foreign enterprises to invest in processing and manufacturing projects. The province is also applying more selective criteria when considering new investment proposals. During a recent working session with a delegation from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs aimed at introducing local potential and infrastructure in preparation for the APEC Year 2027, which Vietnam will host, Vice Chairwoman of the Provincial People’s Committee Nguyen Thi Hoang outlined the province’s investment orientation. Accordingly, Dong Nai is focusing on solutions to attract high-tech and environmentally friendly projects in three strategic sectors: aviation technology; semiconductor and chip manufacturing as well as artificial intelligence (AI); and automation equipment together with information technology devices.

To support its investment attraction goal and generate stronger growth momentum in the coming years, Dong Nai has allocated large land areas to facilitate site clearance and develop additional IPs with a total planned area of about 18,500 hectares. At the same time, the province has planned a high-tech park of around 500 hectares and an information technology IP covering about 100 hectares to draw high-tech investors.

By Vuong The – Translated by M.Nguyet, Thu Ha