To Lam Visits New Zealand

Vietnam's president and Communist Party general secretary, To Lam, arrives in Auckland on Wednesday for the first state visit to New Zealand by a Vietnamese head of state since 2007, a trip that puts a spotlight on one of the fastest-expanding relationships in New Zealand's Asia portfolio.

Prime Minister Christopher Luxon says Vietnam as a country New Zealand can no longer treat as a peripheral partner. With more than 100 million people and GDP growth around 8 percent last year, Vietnam is now one of the standout economies in Asia, and two-way trade with New Zealand has followed suit - reaching NZ$3.41 billion in the year to March, up 72 percent over five years.

Luxon has pointed to food and fibre, education, tourism, technology, aviation and investment as the sectors where he wants that growth to continue.

The visit formalises a relationship that has been rapidly upgraded on paper even as the practical ties have taken longer to catch up. Following the devastation of the "American War" (Chiến tranh Mỹ) , New Zealand and Vietnam established diplomatic relations in 1975, lifting them to a Comprehensive Partnership in 2009, a Strategic Partnership in 2020, and then to a top-tier Comprehensive Strategic Partnership in February last year.

That elevation put New Zealand alongside a small club of countries, including the United States, China, Russia, Australia, France, the United Kingdom and the European Union, that Vietnam has designated as its most important partners. Wellington and Hanoi are now working towards lifting bilateral trade toward $3 billion and expanding cooperation in agriculture, education, climate change and human resource development.

To Lam will spend two days in Auckland rather than Wellington, including a state welcome at Government House (the one in Mt Eden), as well as meetings and lunch with Governor-General Dame Cindy Kiro, PM Luxon and Speaker Gerry Brownlee,

He arrives into Aotearoa from Australia, and meetings with Prime Minister Anthony Albanese which are set to include the signing of a number of agreements. New Zealand is expecting five or six agreements to be sealed, likely spanning trade, education and agricultural cooperation.

The president travels with a heavyweight delegation that underlines how seriously Hanoi is treating the trip: Politburo members including Bui Thi Minh Hoai, who chairs the Vietnam Fatherland Front, Defence Minister Phan Van Giang, Public Security Minister Luong Tam Quang, and the country's foreign minister are all listed among the travelling party, alongside various senior National Assembly and Communist Party officials.

For New Zealand, the visit is as much about positioning as it is about trade figures. Vietnam sits inside ASEAN, APEC and the CPTPP, giving Wellington a partner with genuine multilateral reach at a moment when New Zealand is trying to diversify its economic relationships across the Indo-Pacific rather than lean further on any single major power.

Vietnam's own foreign policy has become markedly more open under To Lam, who took over as general secretary in mid-2024 and became president this April. In roughly two years he has visited China, Russia, Belarus and Cuba as well as the United States, France, South Korea and the United Kingdom.

All those air miles have seen a host of Comprehensive Strategic Partnership upgrades - with France, Malaysia, New Zealand, Indonesia, Singapore, Thailand, the UK and the European Union all elevated since late 2024.

It all points to Hanoi's determination to keep options open across the widening strategic divide between Washington and Beijing, particularly given the unpredictability that has characterised trade policy out of the Trump administration. It also means New Zealand's warmer ties with Vietnam sit inside a broader regional concern about China's assertiveness in the South China Sea.

The topic was mentioned in the joint statements accompanying both the Australian and New Zealand upgrades, and this so-called "bamboo diplomacy" has gently pushed Hanoi closer to partners like Canberra and Wellington even as Vietnam continues to prize its relationship with Beijing.

None of that will be spoken about directly in Auckland this week. The official public programme is focussed on agricultural exports and education links rather than security issues. But the substance of a Comprehensive Strategic Partnership, and the calibre of the delegation accompanying To Lam, suggest New Zealand is being asked to think of Vietnam as more than just a growing export market.

Asia Media Centre