Nguyễn Lộc Hà, Vice Chairman of the HCM City People’s Committee, speaks at the press conference. — Photo coutersy of the organising board of the Autumn Economic Forum 2025

HÀ NỘI — As many as 91 international delegations will attend the Autumn Economic Forum 2025 in HCM City, Director of the Centre for the Fourth Industrial Revolution (C4IR) in HCM City Lê Trường Duy announced at a recent press conference.

Hosted by C4IR, this year’s forum is expected to see the participation of Prime Minister Phạm Minh Chính, Deputy Prime Minister Bùi Thanh Sơn; representatives from diplomatic and consular missions, domestic and international businesses; around 500 senior guests from financial institutions, international organisations, innovation centres, multinational corporations; experts and policymakers, and key figures leading global green transition and digital transformation.

Duy said this highlighted the forum’s scale and significant influence on leaders, experts, and businesses, both domestically and internationally.

Stephan Mergenthaler, CEO of the World Economic Forum (WEF), along with officials from the WEF’s agencies, will attend in person and co-organise key activities, including parallel sessions on smart production, and a high-level policy dialogue with the Vietnamese PM.

Notably, the CEO 500 – Tea Connect programme will serve as a high-level dialogue platform between the Vietnamese government, the municipal authorities, and over 500 domestic and international business leaders, focusing on public-private partnerships, green investment, technological innovation, and modern urban governance. The forum will also showcase key projects seeking investment.

Nguyễn Lộc Hà, Vice Chairman of the municipal People’s Committee and head of the organising board, said this year’s event would take place from November 25-27, focusing its discussions on green growth and digital transformation.

He stressed this would also mark HCM City’s new development agenda, serving not just as a topic for discussion but as a call for action and a guide for planning and implementation.

According to Hà, the world is shifting to a completely new competitive landscape, where advantages are determined not by natural resources, capital, or labour costs, but by technological ecosystems, innovation capacity, and global-standard sustainability. In this era, national strength is measured not by the “scale of investment expansion”, but by the speed of knowledge creation, knowledge transformation, and turning technology into value.

With its expanded development space, HCM City must show transformation capabilities worthy of its role as the nation’s central megacity, Hà said. He emphasised that the city should not only follow global trends but also set Việt Nam’s new development standards based on a knowledge economy, advanced science and technology, and sustainable growth aligned with net zero goals and the global green transition. — VNS