As Vietnam’s relations with the West slowly...

As Vietnam’s relations with the West slowly improve, Japanese investors and traders are cautiously returning to a country that they have shunned for 15 years. A spokesman for the trading firm Toyomenka Kaisha, which is building a factory in Vietnam to make glue, said: “It has become easier to start a business in Vietnam with less foreign pressure. The economy is revitalizing. Labor costs are cheap and raw materials plentiful.” In dealing with Vietnam, most Japanese firms have been using front companies while concealing their own names. But as the political climate improves, more and more are throwing off the disguise. Official Vietnamese figures show that Japan was the fourth-biggest foreign investor this year, with $71 million in six projects, after France, Britain and Belgium. The Japan External Trade Organization, a semi-governmental agency, said Vietnam still had a long way to go before it became an attractive investment because it was handicapped by poor roads and inadequate power supply.