Local press highlight 9th May 2008
PM: Primary priority given to curbing inflation
The Vietnamese Prime Minister reiterated that his cabinet will continue to place top priority on reining in inflation in the coming months while addressing the National Assembly session in Hanoi on May 6.
PM Nguyen Tan Dung asked the law-making body to consider the Government’s request to lower the country’s GDP growth rate target of 8.5-9% to 7% for the current year. PM Dung introduced to the law-makers the Government’s eight-solution package to curb inflation, stabilise macro-economy and ensure social welfare and sustainable development.
He emphasised the implementation of a tight and effective financial and monetary policy as the first in the package.
The PM also referred other tasks, including removing hindrances to production, services and investment attraction, accelerating exports to reduce trade deficit, intensifying management over the market and prices and fighting speculation and smuggling.
While expressing the resolve to control inflation, PM Dung admitted the Government’s shortcomings and weaknesses in managerial and executive work.
He pointed out that the Government had maintained a lax monetary policy for years, especially in 2007, thus driving general means of payments and total outstanding credits to rise high, leaving direct pressure on inflation.
Besides, the PM also pointed to the consecutive overspending rates of 5% for years while the economy has been growing bigger and bigger. “This has not been helpful to the control and slash of the State budget expenditure,” he said.
He mentioned the State’s weaknesses in managing various markets, including the stock and real estate market, and also prices and export and import activities.
Adequate attention has not yet been given to market forecasting and study work, the PM noted, noting agencies’ failure to provide the people with prompt, clear and consistent explanations on new developments arising from the market and the issuance of policies which are sensitive to them.
Reviewing the country’s socio-economic performance in 2007 and the first four months of the year, the Governmental leader said that almost all targets for 2007 were overfulfilled with an economic growth rate of 8.48%.
However, he noted, the unexpected developments of the world economy with high prices of crude oil, food, materials, machinery and equipment in the last months of 2007 have posed fierce challenges to the country’s economic management and negatively impacted the stability of the macro-economy.
The Government has promptly implemented a number of policies and measures to control inflation, enhance pricing management and stabilise the monetary, securities and realty markets. In addition, the Government has also helped remove difficulties for production development and promoted exports and limited trade deficit while ensuring the balance of essential goods and helping farmers, fishermen and disadvantaged people to stabilise their life and production.
PM Dung took the occasion to point out the shortcomings of the national economy such as the economic growth rate of 7.4% in the first quarter of 2008 is still lower than that of last year’s corresponding period (7.8%) and much lower than the whole year’s target of between 8.5% and 9%. The consumer price index rose 11.6% in April compared with last December and up 21.42% over April 2007.
He mentioned developments that are badly affecting the people’s life including inflation, price hike and trade deficit together with complex monetary, securities and real estate markets.
Nhan Dan Online 6.5
Four-month export turnover up 28%
Vietnam’s total export turnover in the January-April period is estimated at US $18.3 billion, up 27.8% against the same period last year, according to the Ministry of Industry and Trade.
In April alone, the country earned an estimated US $5.1 billion from exports, up 38% year-on-year. Of this figure, domestic enterprises contributed US $2.27 billion, up 36.3% while foreign invested enterprises exported US $2.83 billion worth of products, up 39.6%.
Exports of the agricultural, forestry and fisheries sector continued to grow stably due to price advantages. Those products that enjoy high export growth included rice, up 72.6%; rubber, up 23.9%; cashew nuts, up 34% and seafood, up 13.7%.
Key industrial export products have also enjoyed fairly high export growth such as crude oil, up 46.2%; garments, up 24.5%; footwear, up 15.7%, plastic products, up 34.3%, amongst others.
Total import turnover in the past four months is estimated at US $29.36 billion, up 71% against the same period last year. Of this, domestic enterprises have imported US $20.6 billion worth of products, up 86% while foreign invested businesses have imported US $8.8 billion worth of products, up 43.7%.
Imports of automobiles of under 12 seats saw the highest increase, up 11 times, followed by steel and steel billets (up two times), petrol (up 71%) and paper (59.8%).
The January-April trade deficit is estimated at US $11.07 billion, equivalent to 60.6% of the total export turnover in the period and lower than the trade deficit in March of 63.2%.
Nhan Dan Online 6.5
Regulations on human tissue banks issued
The Prime Minister on April 29 signed a decree on the organisation and operation of human tissue banks and the National Centre for Body Part Transplant Control. The decree, consisting of three chapters and 21 articles, outlines the five kinds of legal tissue banks. These include banks run by the Health Ministry; banks run directly by hospitals, institutes, medical and pharmaceutical universities under the Health Ministry or ministries or ministerial-level agencies; banks run by provincial or city departments of health; banks run by hospitals under departments of health care and private tissue banks, such as those run by private hospitals, medical and pharmaceutical universities.
Tissue banks are responsible for receiving human tissues from legal medical establishments and individuals as well as from international co-operation and aid programmes.
Medical establishments are authorised to receive tissues from bodies of dead and living persons as donations in accordance with the law and authorised agencies’ regulations.
These establishments will have to ensure medical records of donors and recipients examined before distributing donated tissues.
The Prime Minister stipulates that the National Centre for Body Part Transplant Control is a non-profit making unit, that has its own network and legal entity, stamp, account and headquarters, as well as is run by the Ministry of Public Health.
The Ministry of Public Health will determine the organisation of the centre’s network.
Nhan Dan Online 6.5
Seminar advises on fighting inflation
A National Assembly-sponsored seminar yesterday advocated the Government’s suspension of work on all non-urgent projects as a viable means of halting the country’s galloping inflation rate.Domestic and international financial experts at the seminar, organised by the NA Committee on Finance and Budget, said that budget spending and inflation were closely related, and that deficits necessarily spur rising rates of inflation.
Director of the Ministry of Planning and Investment’s Finance and Monetary Department Le Quoc Ly said that the Government’s budget deficit over the past two years had been somewhat compensated for by foreign and domestic loans.
The Government, therefore, was not yet under pressure to print more notes.
But Ly pointed to the Government’s policy of stimulating economic growth by spending the bulk of its budget on infrastructure and other key projects as the main reason for the large flows of cash into the economy, which represented both a cause and indicator of inflation.
It is now important that the Government identify non-urgent and ineffective projects that might be postponed, the official said, arguing that given the current circumstances of economic difficulty, the State budget would not be able to afford all scheduled projects without generating a deficit.
Jitendra Modi, an independent expert, suggested that the Government needed to concentrate on developing non-oil incomes by renovating the tax system and reinforcing the new tax policies.
He added that the Government should improve the effectiveness of public projects, review the salary base of State employees, and encourage more FDI capital to help pay for infrastructure projects.
VNS 6.5
Tourism industry in need of new motto
A new motto is needed to promote the nation’s tourism industry and help Viet Nam come closer to its goal of becoming one of Asia’s top tourist destinations over the next two years, says Nguyen Thi Thanh Huong, deputy director of the Tourism Promotion Agency.
A new motto, as well as a comprehensive plan to boost tourism, remained in the planning stages, said Huong.
"We haven’t yet been able to identify all of our unique tourism products or more effective strategies to make Viet Nam a memorable name to travellers," she said.
"Viet Nam is still not a popular name among world travellers, so building an effective motto is extremely important and should be done immediately. We’ve advertised that our strengths are cultural tourism and eco-tourism, but what is actually conveyed to potential tourists seems vague and not striking enough to be memorable."
So far, the campaign to come up with a new motto has gained only initial traction or support from the domestic tourism industry.
Tourism is a spearhead national industry which brought about VND56 trillion ($3.5 billion) in turnover last year and is also viewed as an effective way for the country to promote its image to the world.
In the Government-approved tourism strategy through 2010, Viet Nam has projected welcoming six million international visitors, a doubling of current figures. The industry also has predicted generating a turnover of US$4.5 billion yearly by 2010, an increase of $1 billion over 2007 figures. Insiders have expressed hopes of building tourism as a brand name for Viet Nam much like French wines or Japanese electronics.
VNS 6.5
Nation could make more use of WTO benefits: NA report
Full use has not been made of the benefits from Viet Nam’s World Trade Organisation commitments, a new National Assembly External Affairs Committee survey shows.
The failure was despite the visible positive impact of the commitments.
The results of the two-month-long survey of 20 cities and provinces as well as industries and ministries were published in Ha Noi yesterday.
They show that the WTO commitments have contributed significantly to the attraction of domestic and foreign investment; trade revenue and a shift in economic structure in localities where they have been properly implemented. The survey also found that WTO commitments have boosted administrative reform with the introduction of simpler and more transparent procedures.
But numerous improvements from the building of action plans to the publicising of activities; document checking and mechanisms for reform are still required.
The External Affairs Committee has now proposed that the National Assembly and its committees quicken improvement in the quality of their legislative work and perfect the laws to better meet WTO requirements and regulations.
The committee also wants more research into the impact WTO entry will have on the most vulnerable such as residents of rural Viet Nam, including farmers, so that appropriate remedial policies can be introduced.
VNS 6.5
The Vietnamese Prime Minister reiterated that his cabinet will continue to place top priority on reining in inflation in the coming months while addressing the National Assembly session in Hanoi on May 6.
PM Nguyen Tan Dung asked the law-making body to consider the Government’s request to lower the country’s GDP growth rate target of 8.5-9% to 7% for the current year. PM Dung introduced to the law-makers the Government’s eight-solution package to curb inflation, stabilise macro-economy and ensure social welfare and sustainable development.
He emphasised the implementation of a tight and effective financial and monetary policy as the first in the package.
The PM also referred other tasks, including removing hindrances to production, services and investment attraction, accelerating exports to reduce trade deficit, intensifying management over the market and prices and fighting speculation and smuggling.
While expressing the resolve to control inflation, PM Dung admitted the Government’s shortcomings and weaknesses in managerial and executive work.
He pointed out that the Government had maintained a lax monetary policy for years, especially in 2007, thus driving general means of payments and total outstanding credits to rise high, leaving direct pressure on inflation.
Besides, the PM also pointed to the consecutive overspending rates of 5% for years while the economy has been growing bigger and bigger. “This has not been helpful to the control and slash of the State budget expenditure,” he said.
He mentioned the State’s weaknesses in managing various markets, including the stock and real estate market, and also prices and export and import activities.
Adequate attention has not yet been given to market forecasting and study work, the PM noted, noting agencies’ failure to provide the people with prompt, clear and consistent explanations on new developments arising from the market and the issuance of policies which are sensitive to them.
Reviewing the country’s socio-economic performance in 2007 and the first four months of the year, the Governmental leader said that almost all targets for 2007 were overfulfilled with an economic growth rate of 8.48%.
However, he noted, the unexpected developments of the world economy with high prices of crude oil, food, materials, machinery and equipment in the last months of 2007 have posed fierce challenges to the country’s economic management and negatively impacted the stability of the macro-economy.
The Government has promptly implemented a number of policies and measures to control inflation, enhance pricing management and stabilise the monetary, securities and realty markets. In addition, the Government has also helped remove difficulties for production development and promoted exports and limited trade deficit while ensuring the balance of essential goods and helping farmers, fishermen and disadvantaged people to stabilise their life and production.
PM Dung took the occasion to point out the shortcomings of the national economy such as the economic growth rate of 7.4% in the first quarter of 2008 is still lower than that of last year’s corresponding period (7.8%) and much lower than the whole year’s target of between 8.5% and 9%. The consumer price index rose 11.6% in April compared with last December and up 21.42% over April 2007.
He mentioned developments that are badly affecting the people’s life including inflation, price hike and trade deficit together with complex monetary, securities and real estate markets.
Nhan Dan Online 6.5
Four-month export turnover up 28%
Vietnam’s total export turnover in the January-April period is estimated at US $18.3 billion, up 27.8% against the same period last year, according to the Ministry of Industry and Trade.
In April alone, the country earned an estimated US $5.1 billion from exports, up 38% year-on-year. Of this figure, domestic enterprises contributed US $2.27 billion, up 36.3% while foreign invested enterprises exported US $2.83 billion worth of products, up 39.6%.
Exports of the agricultural, forestry and fisheries sector continued to grow stably due to price advantages. Those products that enjoy high export growth included rice, up 72.6%; rubber, up 23.9%; cashew nuts, up 34% and seafood, up 13.7%.
Key industrial export products have also enjoyed fairly high export growth such as crude oil, up 46.2%; garments, up 24.5%; footwear, up 15.7%, plastic products, up 34.3%, amongst others.
Total import turnover in the past four months is estimated at US $29.36 billion, up 71% against the same period last year. Of this, domestic enterprises have imported US $20.6 billion worth of products, up 86% while foreign invested businesses have imported US $8.8 billion worth of products, up 43.7%.
Imports of automobiles of under 12 seats saw the highest increase, up 11 times, followed by steel and steel billets (up two times), petrol (up 71%) and paper (59.8%).
The January-April trade deficit is estimated at US $11.07 billion, equivalent to 60.6% of the total export turnover in the period and lower than the trade deficit in March of 63.2%.
Nhan Dan Online 6.5
Regulations on human tissue banks issued
The Prime Minister on April 29 signed a decree on the organisation and operation of human tissue banks and the National Centre for Body Part Transplant Control. The decree, consisting of three chapters and 21 articles, outlines the five kinds of legal tissue banks. These include banks run by the Health Ministry; banks run directly by hospitals, institutes, medical and pharmaceutical universities under the Health Ministry or ministries or ministerial-level agencies; banks run by provincial or city departments of health; banks run by hospitals under departments of health care and private tissue banks, such as those run by private hospitals, medical and pharmaceutical universities.
Tissue banks are responsible for receiving human tissues from legal medical establishments and individuals as well as from international co-operation and aid programmes.
Medical establishments are authorised to receive tissues from bodies of dead and living persons as donations in accordance with the law and authorised agencies’ regulations.
These establishments will have to ensure medical records of donors and recipients examined before distributing donated tissues.
The Prime Minister stipulates that the National Centre for Body Part Transplant Control is a non-profit making unit, that has its own network and legal entity, stamp, account and headquarters, as well as is run by the Ministry of Public Health.
The Ministry of Public Health will determine the organisation of the centre’s network.
Nhan Dan Online 6.5
Seminar advises on fighting inflation
A National Assembly-sponsored seminar yesterday advocated the Government’s suspension of work on all non-urgent projects as a viable means of halting the country’s galloping inflation rate.Domestic and international financial experts at the seminar, organised by the NA Committee on Finance and Budget, said that budget spending and inflation were closely related, and that deficits necessarily spur rising rates of inflation.
Director of the Ministry of Planning and Investment’s Finance and Monetary Department Le Quoc Ly said that the Government’s budget deficit over the past two years had been somewhat compensated for by foreign and domestic loans.
The Government, therefore, was not yet under pressure to print more notes.
But Ly pointed to the Government’s policy of stimulating economic growth by spending the bulk of its budget on infrastructure and other key projects as the main reason for the large flows of cash into the economy, which represented both a cause and indicator of inflation.
It is now important that the Government identify non-urgent and ineffective projects that might be postponed, the official said, arguing that given the current circumstances of economic difficulty, the State budget would not be able to afford all scheduled projects without generating a deficit.
Jitendra Modi, an independent expert, suggested that the Government needed to concentrate on developing non-oil incomes by renovating the tax system and reinforcing the new tax policies.
He added that the Government should improve the effectiveness of public projects, review the salary base of State employees, and encourage more FDI capital to help pay for infrastructure projects.
VNS 6.5
Tourism industry in need of new motto
A new motto is needed to promote the nation’s tourism industry and help Viet Nam come closer to its goal of becoming one of Asia’s top tourist destinations over the next two years, says Nguyen Thi Thanh Huong, deputy director of the Tourism Promotion Agency.
A new motto, as well as a comprehensive plan to boost tourism, remained in the planning stages, said Huong.
"We haven’t yet been able to identify all of our unique tourism products or more effective strategies to make Viet Nam a memorable name to travellers," she said.
"Viet Nam is still not a popular name among world travellers, so building an effective motto is extremely important and should be done immediately. We’ve advertised that our strengths are cultural tourism and eco-tourism, but what is actually conveyed to potential tourists seems vague and not striking enough to be memorable."
So far, the campaign to come up with a new motto has gained only initial traction or support from the domestic tourism industry.
Tourism is a spearhead national industry which brought about VND56 trillion ($3.5 billion) in turnover last year and is also viewed as an effective way for the country to promote its image to the world.
In the Government-approved tourism strategy through 2010, Viet Nam has projected welcoming six million international visitors, a doubling of current figures. The industry also has predicted generating a turnover of US$4.5 billion yearly by 2010, an increase of $1 billion over 2007 figures. Insiders have expressed hopes of building tourism as a brand name for Viet Nam much like French wines or Japanese electronics.
VNS 6.5
Nation could make more use of WTO benefits: NA report
Full use has not been made of the benefits from Viet Nam’s World Trade Organisation commitments, a new National Assembly External Affairs Committee survey shows.
The failure was despite the visible positive impact of the commitments.
The results of the two-month-long survey of 20 cities and provinces as well as industries and ministries were published in Ha Noi yesterday.
They show that the WTO commitments have contributed significantly to the attraction of domestic and foreign investment; trade revenue and a shift in economic structure in localities where they have been properly implemented. The survey also found that WTO commitments have boosted administrative reform with the introduction of simpler and more transparent procedures.
But numerous improvements from the building of action plans to the publicising of activities; document checking and mechanisms for reform are still required.
The External Affairs Committee has now proposed that the National Assembly and its committees quicken improvement in the quality of their legislative work and perfect the laws to better meet WTO requirements and regulations.
The committee also wants more research into the impact WTO entry will have on the most vulnerable such as residents of rural Viet Nam, including farmers, so that appropriate remedial policies can be introduced.
VNS 6.5
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