Vietnam to speed free-market reforms
Associated Press, April 19
Hanoi — Vietnam plans to speed up its free-market reforms following this week's Communist Party national congress, an official said Thursday.
The reforms, launched 15 years ago to pull the country out of famine and stagnation, have allowed private enterprise to take a much wider role.
Officials have hesitated, however, in opening the economy more to the outside world, particularly after seeing the effects of Asia's recent currency crisis.
A keynote political report at the four-day congress warned that Vietnam faces the danger of being left behind economically by its Asian neighbours.
"I believe the speed of reforms will be faster because the situation requires us to develop faster now," Deputy Prime Minister Nguyen Manh Cam said.
Delegates at the four-day congress are expected to approve a decision by the party Central Committee to replace the party's conservative leader, Le Kha Phieu, with Nong Duc Manh, a moderate seen as more open to economic reform.
Mr. Cam said Vietnam understands that there are both positive and negative aspects to globalization, and the government's goal is to minimize the negative.
Planning and Investment Minister Tran Xuan Gia, said Vietnam's still-limited level of globalization would allow it to meet its high 7.5-per-cent growth target for this year despite a slowdown in world economic growth.
"Vietnam's economy has opened up, but the level of opening and its dependence on the outside is not strong enough to make Vietnam subject to rapid damage from outside effects," Mr. Gia said.
He said the government will encourage domestic-led growth and develop other policies to counter the international slowdown. He said those policies have yet to be decided.
The government says Vietnam's gross domestic product expanded 6.7 per cent in 2000, up from 4.8 per cent in 1999.
The Asian Development Bank, however, said Thursday that it believes the GDP grew 6.1 per cent last year and predicted it would expand only 6.4 per cent this year.
Mr. Gia, who has led the planning ministry for several years, is expected to step down at the end of the current congress. He is blamed by many party members for Vietnam's failure to implement policies needed to attract greater foreign and local investment. |
