(VOVWORLD) - The General Statistics Office reports that Vietnam’s GDP in the third quarter increased 7.46%, a record high in recent decades. With the current growth rate, Vietnam will likely realize its annual growth target of 6.7%.
 Director General of the General Statistics Office Nguyen Bich Lam talks about socio-economic development over the past 9 months. (Photo: Thuy Hien/BNEWS/VNA) |
Vietnam’s GDP grew more than 6.4% over the past 9 months. In the third quarter alone, it gained a record growth of 7.46%. This strong performance is mainly due to strong growth in the agriculture, forestry, fishery, industry, and construction sectors. Processing and manufacturing saw an increase of 12.8%, the highest growth in that sector in years.
So far this year, Vietnam has earned an estimated 154 billion USD from exports, up nearly 20% from last year. Committed foreign investment capital reached 25.5 billion USD, up 34%.
Nguyen Bich Lam, Director General of the General Department of Statistics, told VOV: “Restructuring in the agriculture, forestry, and fishery sectors has increased the value of products in those fields and stabilized consumption of those products. The restructuring has also created confidence in production and business. As a result, the World Economic Forum has ranked Vietnam’s competitiveness 55th overall, up five places from last year and up 20 from five years ago. Exports are another highlight helping the Vietnamese economy grow. In two consecutive months, August and September, for the first time, Vietnam’s export revenues exceeded 19 billion USD.”
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 Increasing oil exploration volume is considered a way to ensure growth.
(Photo: vietsov.com.vn)
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The investment and business environment has improved. The government’s bold determination to improve the business environment and cut administrative procedures has raised the number of newly established enterprises to nearly 94,000, with registered capital totaling almost 40 billion USD.
But Vietnam is facing a number of challenges, including a decline of mining, a slowdown of agricultural production, slow budget collection, and slow disbursement of public investment capital. To resolve the situation, the government is trying to reduce public spending to relieve public debt.
Nguyen Dinh Cung, Director of the Central Institute for Economic Management, said: “We should pay more attention to the effectiveness of public investment than the amount of investment. We should outline solutions and then allocate the funding to the most promising projects.”
If Vietnam wants to meet its annual target of 6.7%, the growth rate in the fourth quarter must be at least 7.31%.