The visit takes place at a time when bilateral relations are developing exceptionally well across multiple fields, with a solid foundation of political trust and close economic, trade, and investment connectivity.
During General Secretary To Lam’s recent historic visit to Singapore, both sides declared an upgrade of their relations to a comprehensive strategic partnership, opening a bright new chapter in their collaborative journey spanning over half a century. Vietnam is also the first country in ASEAN with which Singapore has established a comprehensive strategic partnership.
Political and diplomatic cooperation has been strengthened, with increased delegation exchanges at all levels. Cooperation has been actively promoted across Party, state, government, parliamentary, and people-to-people channels.
The Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV) maintains good cooperative relations with Singapore’s People's Action Party (PAP) in a wide range of substantive forms. Leaders of both parties frequently exchange views on national development experiences. Both sides are effectively collaborating in strategic personnel training and development. Parliamentary cooperation has seen notable developments, particularly through the signing of a cooperation agreement between the Vietnamese and Singaporean parliaments.
Economic cooperation is a bright spot of Vietnam-Singapore relations. In 2024, bilateral trade value reached 10.3 billion USD, a 14.7% increase over 2023. In the same year, Vietnam surpassed Thailand and India to become the largest rice supplier for Singapore for the first time.
Singapore is currently ASEAN’s largest and the world’s second largest foreign investor in Vietnam, with registered capital totalling over 84 billion USD. The Vietnam-Singapore Industrial Park (VSIP) network, a symbol of successful economic cooperation, is now present in 13 Vietnamese provinces and cities.
These VSIPs have attracted over 18.7 billion USD in investment and created jobs for more than 300,000 workers. Conversely, Vietnam currently has 153 investment projects in Singapore, with registered capital of over 690 million USD, primarily in the fields of science-technology, information and communication.
These sweet fruits of economic cooperation are the results of the persistent nurturing efforts by both countries’ generations of leaders and citizens. The two countries effectively maintain the ministerial conference mechanism based on the Vietnam-Singapore Connectivity Framework Agreement to review and resolve obstacles while exchanging specific orientations, solutions and action plans to enhance economic and trade cooperation.
Singapore is also the first country with which Vietnam established a green-digital economic partnership in February 2023, creating an important starting point to guide the transformation of both economies towards promising new fields such as digital economy, green and circular economy, innovation, clean energy, and climate change response.
In March 2025, during the General Secretary To Lam’s official visit to Singapore, both sides signed multiple cooperation documents in wind energy trade, digital transformation and financial innovation, laying an important basis for the practical and effective implementation of the Vietnam-Singapore comprehensive strategic partnership in the coming period.
Beyond economic cooperation, cooperation between Vietnam and Singapore has also achieved numerous successes in other fields, notably in education and training. The two countries signed a memorandum of understanding on educational cooperation in August 2023, established partnerships between training institutions and provided each other with numerous undergraduate and postgraduate scholarships, alongside extensive staff, lecturer and student exchanges.
Since the late 1990s, the Singaporean government has awarded Vietnam 30 secondary-level scholarships annually, with this figure doubling from 2023. Additionally, five agreements between the two foreign ministries regarding the training of CPV officials in Singapore have been effectively implemented, contributing to improving personnel quality.
As the two countries recently upgraded their relations to a comprehensive strategic partnership, the Singaporean PM’s official visit to Vietnam is a significant event that will consolidate the high-level political trust foundation between the two countries and usher Vietnam-Singapore relations into a new cooperation era.
The visit also affirms that Vietnam and Singapore, together with other ASEAN member states, are determined to build a united and strong ASEAN Community, contributing to maintaining peace, stability, cooperation, and development in the region and worldwide.
