Havana, Cuba.- The attraction of foreign investments and the development of an industrial park are some of the aims of the company ViMariel S.A., a Cuban entity with fully Vietnamese capital located in the Mariel Special Development Zone (ZEDM).

The incorporation of ViMariel expresses a new stage of solidarity in times of renewal, a new beginning for future agreements in the two people’s traditional relations and support for Cuba’s newly elected government, told Prensa Latina News Agency the Ambassador of Vietnam on the Island, Nguyen Trung Thanh.

ViMariel has a political meaning beyond the economic, said the diplomat by sealing the first administrative concession in the Zone.

PROJECTIONS IN THE ZEDM

The injection of foreign capital will come from entities in Europe, Latin America and Asia that have state-of-the-art technologies and facilitate greater benefits to the Caribbean island, explained to this agency the Vietnamese counterpart, President of the Board of Directors of Corporacion Viglacera SA Tran Anh Tuan.

Anh Tuan said that ViMariel is a subsidiary of the Vietnamese trading company he runs, a leader in industrial parks with more than 200 associated investment companies.

In the enclave, infrastructures will be built on land that includes, in a first stage, the concession of some 156 hectares with possibilities of expansion to 300 hectares in the term of 50 years, he said.

We hope that with our 20-years business experience we can take up the space of the newly formed entity, he stressed.

The administrative concession -given by Decree No. 340- will be aimed at projecting, investing, building, managing and exploiting the infrastructure, and setting up the aforementioned industrial park, located in Sector A of the ZEDM, about 45 kilometers to the west of the Cuban capital.

The manager said that through ViMariel they intend to establish companies in the Zone with the potential to meet Cuba’s demand, first, and then to expand to Latin America and the rest of the world.

So far, they have held meetings with representatives of companies in Belgium, Spain and Portugal, but the most important is a Chinese company specializing in glass production, he explained.

General Director of the ZEDM Office Ana Teresa Igarza explained that the obligations that ViMariel would fulfill for the development of an industrial park were already established, and noted that this entity is constituted before a public notary and inserted in the mercantile registry.

As of this moment, a timetable begins providing permits, licenses and authorizations, as well as the start of infrastructure works. First to urbanize the area, a totally virgin land, and from there, the attraction of foreign investment to later be approved by the Cuban office, she said.

There will be several kinds of business, but all focused on the pillars defined in the ZEDM: industries of construction materials, heavy industry, containers and packaging, manufacturing based on supply, personal and household hygiene, biotechnology and logistics activity, remarked Igarza.

The board stressed that the development of the industrial park will also attract business to the country, an element that will invigorate and multiply the efforts made by the ZEDM during these five years to attract foreign investment.

This agreement is fall within a very important context for Cuba, because under the modifications made in the economic structure and the consolidation of our socialist project, the proposal will reproduce the efforts with the support of a sister country,which has a sociopolitical system equal to Cuba, she said.

LEGAL ACTIONS

There are two business figures to set up the ZEDM: concessionaire and user. The first one is held only by the newly established company ViMariel. That’s why the second one has greater representation.

The difference between both legal statuses is that the user is a company that sets up, produces or provides services. In contrast, the concessionaire has a public function and acts under the terms and conditions authorized by the State, that is, it is a private figure that will develop a state function.

In the case of ViMariel, the company will develop infrastructure, within the legal framework established by the ZEDM, whose greater time for the concessionaires is 50 years, renewable only at the end of the agreed period.

According to the legislation, an industrial park is an urbanized area (streets and public lighting), where industrial buildings can be built. This will make it easier for investors not to start from the beginning and shorten time and regulatory procedures.