Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) poured into the Ho Chi Minh City’sexport processing and industrial zones in the first quarter of 2014 hit243.5 million USD, up 97.26 percent over the same period last year.

According to the HCM City Export Processing and Industrial ZonesAuthority (Hepza), it granted investment licenses to 12 new FDIprojects with a total registered capital of 223.2 million USD during theperiod, up more than 8 times compared to the figure of the same periodlast year.

Meanwhile, nine ongoing projects of this kind in the City raised their existing capital by 20.34 million USD.

Internal capital inflow to the zones in the period reached almost713.3 billion VND (33.91 million USD), registering a year-on-yearincrease of nearly 65 percent. The City also granted investment licensesto eight new projects in the period.

Hepza has to datelicensed 1,293 projects with a total capital of over 8 billion USD, ofwhich 514 are FDI projects worth 4.935 billion USD.

In the second quarter, Hepza plans to assist the Vietnam – JapanTechno Park project, work harder to attract Japanese enterprises andaccelerate the construction and expansion of the An Ha, Dong Nam and TanPhu Trung industrial parks.

This year, the southerneconomic and business hub aims to attract 2.5 billion USD in FDIcapital, which is 20 percent higher than last year's figure.

Last year, it drew in 2.08 billion USD in FDI.-VNA