Hanoi (VNA) – The American Chamber of Commerce (Amcham) in Vietnam andthe Vietnam Association of Foreign Invested Enterprises (VAFIE) jointly held aworkshop in Hanoi on March 1 proposing new policies for foreign-investedbusinesses in the pharmaceutical industry.

Speaking at the event, VAFIE Vice President Nguyen Van Toanexpressed his hope that delegates to the event will contribute their ideasabout several new policies in the pharmaceutical field in order to make thesepolicies come into reality effectively once they are promulgated.

Representatives from businesses and legal and commercialexperts held that several new regulations in the field such as the Government’sDecree No.54 guiding the enforcement of the Pharmacy Law, and a draft Circularguiding several articles of the decree are inadequate and unconformable to Vietnam’sinternational commitments and its related laws.

These documents also contain some regulations intervening inbusinesses’ self-controlled activities, they said.

Sharing Vietnam’s World Trade Organisation (WTO) commitmentson distribution and supporting services, Nguyen Thi Thu Trang, Director of the VietnamChamber of Commerce and Industry’s WTO Centre, said that the Enterprise Law’sClause 7 stipulates that enterprises have the right to self-decide andself-control their business activities.

Therefore, they can carry out their activities by themselvesor entrust or reach an agreement with other parties to do these works.

She asked for the revision of Clause 3 of the draft Circularguiding several articles of Decree No.54 which prescribes that enterprises mustdirectly do distribution-related activities.

Chung Yee Seck, lawyer of the Baker McKenzie Law Firm and arepresentative from Amcham’s legal sub-committee, stated that Decree No.54 andthe draft circular do not allow foreign-invested enterprises to providemedicine preservation and transportation services, which are not banned orlimited in the Pharmacy Law.

In addition, legal documents are not permitted to apply retrospectiveness,except several special cases mentioned in the Law on the Promulgation of LegalDocuments.

However, the draft circular stipulates foreign-investedenterprises must abide by Decree No.54. This means that they have to stoppreservation and transportation services after the decree takes effect.

Chung said that the regulation is in contrary to Vietnam’sinternational commitments and not confirmable with the investment protectionprinciple of the Investment Law and the non-retrospective principle of the Lawon the Promulgation of Legal Documents.-VNA