(VOVworld) 2012 is predicted to be a difficult year for Vietnam’s socio economic development goals. Since early this year, Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung has asked relevant ministries and sectors to closely follow developments and take more drastic measures in order to achieve the set targets.

Building more public housing is one of Vietnam's targets for this year

This year, Vietnam aims to continue reining in inflation and stabilizing the macro economy. To this end, it is important to successfully implement monetary policies, ensure a supply-demand balance, and stabilize the prices of essential goods. As a key factor in realizing these targets, the industry and trade sector is set to increase this year’s industrial production value by 13% from last year. Accordingly, the sector will focus on enhancing high tech and high-added value industries, boosting exports and encouraging agro forestry and aqua product processing. The sector’s target is to increase export values by 13% to earn 109 billion USD this year. Minister of Finance Vuong Dinh Hue says that to achieve the target of reducing the budget surplus to below 4.8% of GDP, it’s necessary to boost production and avoid tax evasion. The Ministry of Finance has instructed the General Department of Customs to work out a management plan for temporary import for re-export goods to better control taxes in this field. The Tax Department and Customs Department are required to review the VAT refunds and step up measures to collect tax debts. "The Ministry of Finance is exerting every effort to increase the revenue estimate by between 5 and 8% as set out by the National Assembly with priority given to avoiding tax evasion. All ministries, sectors and localities are required to cut their spending by 10% to reduce public investment and increase spending on people and social welfare. We must increase the efficiency of public investment and productivity", said Minister Hue.

Special attention has been paid to ensuring social welfare, improving the quality of human resources to serve industrialization and modernization. 1.6 million jobs should be generated this year and the percentage of trained workforce should be raised to 46%. "Since early this year, we have put in a place a number of exemplary vocational training programs in aquaculture and growing organic vegetables. The Ministry has asked vocational training centers to work with enterprises on training programs. We also plan to cooperate with the Ministry of Education and Training to develop 40 national vocational training centers and 12 key centers, which can meet regional and international demand", said Minister of Labor, Invalids and Social Affairs Pham Thi Hai Chuyen.

Developing accommodations for low-income earners is also one of the country’s targets for this year. "The Ministry of Construction will work out accommodation plans meeting the needs of each target group. Housing development is hard work, but developing subsidized housing and accommodation for the poor is more difficult. We hope other ministries and localities will support our efforts to build more public housing in the near future", said Minister of Construction Trinh Dinh Dung.

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