The president of the Generalitat, Salvador Illa, continues his Asian tour, during which he plans to travel to Vietnam and Singapore. Accompanied by the conseller for European Union and Foreign Action, Jaume Duch, Illa visited three Catalan companies this Sunday in the city of Da Nang (Vietnam), where he defended that Catalonia should strengthen its “international presence” to attract new economic markets.
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In a media address, the president alluded to some current issues in Catalonia. He gave full support to the head of Education, Esther Niubó, and insisted on blaming a “technical issue” for the invalidation of Catalonia’s results in the PISA 2025 test.
Illa also called for a “calm” and unhurried debate on the expansion, maintenance, and financing of the AP-7 motorway so that, he says, what happened with infrastructure such as the railway and airport networks, where he believes action was taken too late, does not happen with the road network.
From the Vietnamese city of Da Nang, the president advocated for an open and internationalized economy for Catalonia and emphasized the need to reinforce what he considers the strategic character of Southeast Asia: “Very particularly Vietnam as one of the ten key countries for us,” the Govern reported.
Illa cited the Catalan company Relats as an example of open economies, as well as the Catalan companies Tucai and Savall (which he visited this Sunday) and the multinational Simon, all with plants in Vietnam.
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In total, 1,274 Catalan companies regularly export to the Asian region (with a particularly strong presence in Vietnam, Singapore, the Philippines, Thailand, and Malaysia), whose exports, Illa highlighted, have doubled in the last ten years. Last year, exports to this area reached 1,647.8 million euros.
Regarding Vietnam, Catalan exports represent 37.6% of all Spanish exports to this country, and last year alone, in 2025, Catalan exports to Vietnam grew by 11.1%.
On the governmental level, Illa and Duch met with the Vice President of the Da Nang People’s Committee, Nguyen Thi Anh Thi. Da Nang is the main city in central Vietnam and one of the country’s economic and logistical engines, which has developed as one of the “most relevant ports and a technological hub.”
After his visit to Da Nang and the country’s capital, Hanoi, Illa will also visit the country’s economic capital, Ho Chi Minh City.
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