Vietnam plans to boost trade links with China

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HANOI, July 17 (AFP): Vietnam plans to boost transport and trade links with neighbouring China by upgrading a major northern highway and sea port by 2020 under a multi-billion- dollar proposal announced today.

The new "economic corridor" is part of an emerging web of road links, many part-funded by the Asian Development Bank (ADB), connecting China and regional countries that also include Myanmar, Thailand, Laos and Cambodia.

Vietnam's Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung has signed off on a plan for a 1.4-billion-dollar six-lane expressway from Hanoi to the border town of Lang Son, to connect with a road to Nanning in China's Guangxi province.

Vietnam, with ADB funding, is already upgrading its Hanoi road and rail links to the northwestern border town of Lao Cai, to speed up the flow of goods and people to Kunming in southern China's Yunnan province.