With its unique characteristic of having a long border with two provinces of the Lao People's Democratic Republic: Luang Prabang and Hua Phan, Son La currently has comprehensive cooperation relations with 9 out of 18 provinces of the Lao People's Democratic Republic, including Hua Phan, Luang Prabang, Bokeo, Oudomxay, Phongsaly, Luang Namtha, Xay Nha Bu Ly, Xieng Khouang, and Xay Som Bun. Son La province is maintaining good friendly relations with the northern provinces of Laos and has engaged in many diplomatic activities and exchanges in the fields of culture, economics, trade, services, education, etc. Some activities supporting investment and cooperation in trade development are gradually taking shape and have initially yielded many positive results.

In leading and directing the implementation of cooperation with the northern provinces of Laos, the Provincial Party Committee, the Provincial People's Council, and the Provincial People's Committee of Son La province have paid close attention to the guidance. They maintain cooperation agreements and support activities between different levels, sectors, and border districts of Son La province, such as: training in Vietnamese language, professional skills, and expertise for officials, soldiers, police officers, students; technical training and model transfer in the field of agricultural production... They closely coordinate in fulfilling commitments and reaching consensus within multilateral cooperation frameworks on issues related to both countries, aiming to garner support and assistance from countries and organizations in the region and internationally to promote and transform economic cooperation between Vietnam and Laos in general, and between Son La province and the northern provinces of Laos in particular.

Foreign cooperation and international integration have received significant attention and have become a central focus in cooperation forums between Son La province and the northern provinces of Laos in particular, and in the region in general. This includes: strengthening cooperation with foreign diplomatic missions and regional cooperation; improving the business environment and creating a favorable business environment for enterprises from Son La province and the northern provinces of Laos to invest together.

In addition, the province is implementing the planning for the construction of the border gate area and the Long Sap border economic zone (a Decision has been issued allowing the preparation of the zoning plan and detailed plan for the Long Sap international border gate area in Moc Chau district); directing the implementation of investment preparation for infrastructure projects in the border gate area, including: the project to invest in the construction of the main Long Sap border gate into the Long Sap International Border Gate; and the project to invest in the construction of the Long Sap International Border Gate, which has been added to the medium-term public investment plan for the period 2021-2025 (second time) and approved by the National Assembly in Resolution No. 29/2021/QH15 dated July 28, 2021 (to date, there is no Decision assigning the medium-term public investment plan for the period 2021-2025 from the Ministry of Planning and Investment). Allocate funding to support the implementation of the "Office building for the border control force at Pa Háng border gate" project to ensure the conditions for upgrading the Lóng Sập border gate to an international border gate; Invest in the construction of a health station in Phiêng Sa village, Xiềng Khọ district, with funding from the Vietnam Joint Stock Commercial Bank for Industry and Trade, amounting to VND 1,964,848,000.

Son La province and the northern provinces of Laos maintain regular contact, exchange information, and coordinate closely to implement cooperation programs for agricultural and rural development. The forest protection programs between the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development of Son La province and the Departments of Agriculture and Forestry of the northern provinces of Laos have been highly effective in protecting forests and preventing and fighting forest fires in border areas. Agricultural production models have been implemented in Muong La district, Udomxay province, Laos: support for a model of planting Taiwanese GL4 mango trees (3 hectares); support for a model of planting peanuts (1 hectare); and support for a model of planting green beans (1 hectare).

Simultaneously, the Vietnam-Laos Trade and Tourism Exhibition 2017 was organized in Son La city and Moc Chau district with a total of over 250 booths, attracting the participation of domestic businesses as well as businesses from Hua Phan, Bokeo, and Oudomxay provinces of the Lao People's Democratic Republic. This contributed to strengthening the promotion and introduction of potential and advantageous products of Son La province to the Lao market, creating opportunities for meetings, exchanges, and cooperation in investment promotion, trade promotion, and tourism between businesses of the two countries. Discussions also covered the investment attraction and production and business development policies of the Party and State of both countries and provinces. Experiences in state management in the field of Industry and Trade were shared, along with investment needs and production and consumption linkages for goods in both provinces, creating favorable conditions for the development of trade and import/export activities for traders and border residents.

To effectively fulfill the tasks of cooperation, friendship, and neighborly relations between the two countries, from the perspective of connecting investment cooperation, promoting trade, exchanges, and promoting tourism and service activities with the goal of comprehensively promoting investment projects between Vietnam and Laos, in the coming time, Son La province will continue to strengthen cooperation in all fields, maintain regular visits, contacts, and working sessions; strengthen and improve the effectiveness of defense and security cooperation, cooperation between localities of the two countries...; affirm the determination to elevate economic cooperation to a level commensurate with the overall special relationship between the two countries, especially promoting border trade. Continue to pay attention to planning and investing in infrastructure between Son La and the provinces of Laos, especially the transportation and trade infrastructure system in border areas, integrating investment in essential infrastructure with building stable living conditions for people in border regions.

Nhu Thuy