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At the Thanh Hóa Investment Promotion Conference on March 29, 2026, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chính said the province has “enormous potential” and set strategic directions for Thanh Hóa to break through as a new growth pole for Vietnam in the 2026-2031 period.
The Prime Minister noted that 2026 is the first year of implementing the 14th Party Congress Resolution, marking a new development phase with high requirements for speed, quality and sustainability—particularly the goal of achieving double-digit growth. He said that while the global environment remains complex and conflicts in the Middle East are affecting global supply chains, the situation also creates opportunities and challenges for Vietnam and for Thanh Hóa in particular.
Assessing the province, the Prime Minister described Thanh Hóa as a “Vietnam in miniature,” bringing together many potentials and outstanding advantages. He highlighted the province’s “Four Mountains”:
He also pointed to Thanh Hóa’s advantages in agriculture and tourism, citing destinations including Sam Son, Pu Luong, Lam Kinh, Thanh Nhà Hồ, and Suối Cá thần Cẩm Thủy. The Prime Minister said the province has a strong working-age population of more than 2.1 million people, accounting for 56% of the population, alongside a steadily integrated infrastructure system linking road, rail, sea and air.
With these strengths, he said Thanh Hóa is among the localities meeting conditions to become a “model province” in line with President Hồ Chí Minh’s instructions, and that it can serve as a foundation for double-digit growth in the 2026-2030 period.
Prime Minister Pham Minh Chính urged Thanh Hóa to adopt a selective investment-attraction approach, using efficiency, technology, value addition, environmental protection and sustainable development as core criteria. He called for prioritizing large-scale projects with broad spillover effects and for making effective use of differentiated local potential and competitive advantages.
He said the province should focus on leveraging the strengths of the “Four Driving Centers” and “Six Economic Corridors,” while attracting investment in areas including processing and manufacturing, energy, refining and petrochemicals, logistics, tourism and the blue economy.
To implement the directions, the Prime Minister proposed seven core tasks:
The Prime Minister also urged businesses and investors to take a long-term view, pursue sustainable development, comply with Vietnamese law, fulfill commitments, ensure project progress and quality, apply modern technology, protect the environment and care for workers.
He reiterated the Government’s consistent stance that investors’ success is Vietnam’s success, and that a company’s success is the success of the locality. He said the Government will accompany Thanh Hóa with sincerity, empathy and concrete actions, in the spirit of the “three together”—listen and understand together, share a common vision and action together, work together, win together, benefit together and develop together.
Concluding his remarks, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chính expressed confidence that, with Thanh Hóa’s tradition, strong aspiration, enormous potential and the high determination of the Party Committee, authorities and people of the province—together with support from the central government, the business community and central assistance—Thanh Hóa will develop faster, more sustainably and more comprehensively, and will soon become a new growth pole for the country.
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