Vietnam PM Chairs Irregular Meeting on Measures for GDP Growth Rate of 8.5 per cent

Vietnam Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung held an irregular meeting, hastily urging his cabinet members to step up efforts to achieve the set economic growth rate of 8.5 per cent in the remaining months, state media reported on Thursday.

 

PM Dung asked the cabinet to focus on promoting exports, scale back the trade deficit, tighten control over prices of consumer goods and reduce poverty rate.

 

According to a Ministry of Planning and Investment report, Vietnam’s economy will set a record of a decade high growth rate of between 8.4-8.5 per cent.

 

The agro-forestry-fisheries sector obtained a growth rate of between 3.2-3.3 per cent, industry and construction, 10.6-10.7 per cent, services – 8.7-8.8 per cent. GDP per capita also increased to 835 USD.

 

PM Dung said 2008 GDP growth should hover between 9.1-9.2 per cent, GDP per capita will come in at close US$1,000 and the poverty rate should be slashed to 11 per cent.

 

Administrative reform, human resource training, fighting against corruption and wastefulness were tasks to be continued, Dung said.

 

Domestic economists and observers analyzed that to help the country’s economy take off soon, it needs about US$140 billion from now till 2020 to develop its infrastructure networks, which are based mainly on ODA loans. However, the ODA disbursement is said to be too slow compared with that in other regional countries. (Government’s Website, Local sources)