Ministry proposes fund to back SMEs
 
The Ministry of Planning and Investment's Enterprises Development Department is planning to submit a proposal to the Prime Minister to create a small-medium-sized enterprises development fund.

Under the plan, preferential loans would be equivalent to 70 percent of total investment capital of projects. However, total value would not exceed VND30 billion.

Terms of loans would be fixed in a way that is appropriate to borrowers' payment ability and project conditions, but they would not be beyond seven years.

Interest rates on loans from the fund would not exceed 80 percent of the rates of ordinary loans being applied by commercial banks.

It also aims to attract legal financial sources from overseas individuals and organisations including Official Development Assistance (ODA), and capital sources entrusted by domestic and overseas individuals and organisations to support the development of SMEs.

SMEs that can access preferential loans from the fund would have projects or development programmes involved in industries that are given investment priority by the Government.

The loans would help them develop production and trading activities and improve competitive ability.

Le Quoc Khanh, director of the Nam Ha Joint Stock Company, say the establishment of the SME development fund is good news for SMEs since many of them are facing difficulties, particularly in capital shortages.

Major enterprises need large amounts of capital and little is left over to lend to smaller companies, according to senior economic expert Pham Chi Lan.

MPI's Enterprises Development Department, citing study results, said that a SME development fund is necessary as SMEs are facing many capital-related problems.

The submitted proposal includes results from a survey of the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), which showed that 80 percent of SMEs did not receive credit support.

Although the Credit Guarantee Fund at many localities was set up in 2002, only a few SMEs have had access to this financial source.

High lending interest rates and difficult lending conditions are the biggest obstacles that have prevented SMEs from bank loans, while most SMEs expect to have easier access to loans from credit organisations.

A representative of the Enterprises Development Fund said that if the SME Development Fund is established, it will create an additional financial channel for SMEs in addition to current traditional sources.

The fund would also be a State-owned, large-scale financial institution to ensure that it can gather financial sources to support SMEs at home and abroad in line with the laws.

Tay Ninh increases border trade

Tay Ninh province in southern Vietnam will develop a network of markets along its border with Cambodian provinces.

The Tay Ninh provincial department of industry and trade and the Vietnam Ministry of Industry and Trade worked with the Cambodian Ministry of Commerce on this project at a meeting on October 10.

According to the zoning plan for developing a wholesale and retail network in the province, Tay Ninh will build markets and goods exchange areas at both its main and subordinate border gates.

In the near future, Tay Ninh will coordinate with Cambodia’s provinces of Svey Rieng, Prey Veng, and Kampong Cham to launch trade promotion, marketing and sales activities.

Vietnamese Counsellor of Commerce to Cambodia Vu Thinh Cuong said Tay Ninh needs to invest in its infrastructure, banking system, and industrial zones along the border.

Gold Star awards to be announced on October 15

A press conference was held in Hanoi on October 10 to announce the Sao Vang Dat Viet (Vietnam Gold Star) awards ceremony and other activities to mark Vietnam Entrepreneurs Week.

200 leading Vietnamese brands representing 25 commodity groups were nominated for the Vietnam Gold Star Award. Among the top ten Vietnamese brands for 2011 are leading enterprises such as FPT, Truong Hai Automobile Company, Viet Tien Garment Joint Stock Company, Trung Nguyen Coffee, and Vietinbank.

Ten enterprises that have made significant contributions to social development will also be honoured this year.

Nguyen Manh Cuong, deputy president of the Vietnam Young Entrepreneurs Association said that, in addition to applying science and technology, integrating internationally, and investing abroad, nominated businesses should be working towards a knowledged-based economy, improving their social responsibility and paying attention to workers' rights and interests as well as the environment and the community.

The Vietnam Gold Star awards ceremony will be held on October 15 by the Vietnam Young Entrepreneurs Association Central Committee.

A variety of activities will also be held in Hanoi to mark the Vietnam Entrepreneurs' Week starting on October 10. They include the fourth ASEAN-China Young Entrepreneurs' Forum, a Vietnamese trade fair on international integration and a seminar on financial solutions for Vietnamese businesses in times of crisis.

German news agency hails Vietnam’s economy

Vietnam is one of the fastest growing economies in the South East Asian region, reports the German Press Agency (DPA).

The remark was made coinciding with German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s official visit to Vietnam, starting on October 11. During her first ever visit, Ms. Merkel will discuss economic issues and hold political talks with Vietnamese leaders.

According to the DPA, “the miracle of the Vietnamese economy” began in 1986 when the country adopted an open-door policy and implemented major economic reforms. Last year, the country’s total gross domestic product (GDP) increased by nearly 7 percent. Vietnam’s key exports included petroleum, rice, coffee, garments and textiles, footwear and fish.

Last year, Vietnam exported goods worth EUR2.94 billion to Germany, up 28.4 percent, while Germany exported commodities worth EUR1.48 billion to Vietnam including machinery and chemical products. Germany is now Vietnam's largest trade partner in the European Union.

Russian, Ukrainian investors flock to Binh Thuan

Investments from Russia and Ukraine into the coastal province of Binh Thuan’s tourism industry are rising strongly following the footprints of travelers from these two countries, a local official said.

Ngo Minh Chinh, director of the provincial Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism, said Russian and Ukrainian investors were picking up projects on their own or cooperating with local partners to develop tourism facilities there.

Binh Thuan, whose capital city of Phan Thiet is emerging as a popular destination especially among Russian and Ukrainian travelers, has captured strong attention from investors who want to set up facilities there to cater to their tourists, he said.

In the January-September period, Binh Thuan Province attracted around 220,000 international tourists, most of whom came from Russia, Germany, France, the United States, Korea. The number of Russian tourists has increased gradually in recent years with their average stay lasting about two weeks at beach resorts.

“Tourists from Russia currently account for 40% the total number of international arrivals in Binh Thuan, making Russian investors pay more attention to the province,” Chinh said.

There has not been an official calculation of total investments but most projects are big ones. For instance, the project of Delta Valley Co., a joint venture between Vietnam and Ukraine, is to be developed on an area of 1,000 hectares with an investment of over US$400 million and includes villas, a five-star hotel, a golf course, and entertainment sections.

In order to set the right course for tourism development in the province, Binh Thuan is mulling ways to diversify the province’s tourism products, such as sea sport center, Formula 1 racing area, and yacht and hot air balloon services.  

The provincial government has also approved a tourism development strategy towards 2015, aiming to attract around 500,000 international tourists in 2015. To achieve this, the province’s tourism is trying to diversify products by not only taking advantages of its beautiful beaches to build resorts but also developing sport and entertainment services.

“We will still focus on sea tourism development in line with the province’s major advantage, but development and diversification of tourism services is also needed. Our first moves include building a training center for water sports and organizing an international surfing competition next year,” he added.

Most of existing tourism projects in Binh Thuan Province are small, covering only about two hectares each. However, the province now gives priority to big projects covering an area of above five hectares with high quality from at least three-star standards.

Binh Thuan Province is estimated to welcome around 2.8 million local and foreign tourists this year and obtain a turnover of VND3 trillion.
 
Vietnam to promote tourism in Premier League

Vietnam tourism’s promotion slogan and website address will appear on electronic advertising boards in 12 matches of the Premier League from the middle of this month until the year-end.  

Besides, promotion posters and video clips will be shown within one month in 60 stadiums where matches of leading football clubs such as Manchester United, Arsenal, Chelsea, Manchester City, Liverpool, Tottenham, and Everton take place.

The Ministry of Culture, Sports and Culture has spent VND3 billion on this program, in cooperation with Sports Revolution, a telecom firm from the United Kingdom, said Tran Nhat Hoang, director of Cultural, Sport and Tourism Promotion Center.

“The cost of VND3 billion is just enough for promotion in ten matches, but we are given two extra matches and advertising posters,” Hoang told the Daily on Monday.

This program, in combination with Vietnam Airlines’ promotion campaign, will have better effects as the air carrier has advertised Vietnam’s tourism in the Premier League on posters since August in preparation for the opening of the direct flight between Vietnam and the United Kingdom in December, he said.

Seeing that the United Kingdom is a potential market, Vietnam has made many tourism promotions in this country over the past two years, including advertisements on taxi-cabs and tourism magazines such as National Geographic UK.

In related news, the Guardian has announced the tourism awards 2011, in which Vietnam together with Japan, Maldives, Peru and New Zealand were voted to be the five favorite destinations of tourists.
 
Saigontourist Vietnam’s leading tour operator in 2010

Saigontourist Travel Service Co. was recognized as the leading tour operator in the country, catering to 320,000 international and domestic customers in 2010, the Vietnam Tourism Association said in its Tourism Awards 2010.

Out of 20 leading tour operators nationwide, 13 firms are from HCMC and other firms from Hanoi, Danang, Can Tho cities and An Giang Province.

Criteria for choosing the award winners include the number of customers, quality of services and high turnover, according to the association.

The top 10 domestic tour operators in 2010 are Saigontourist, Fiditour, Ben Thanh Tourist, Lua Viet Travel, Van Hoa Viet Travel, Youth Tourist (YTC), An Giang Tourimex, Can Tho Tourist and An Giang Travel.

The top 10 outbound tour operators include Saigontourist, Ben Thanh Tourist, APEX Vietnam, Vietnamtourism, Fiditour, Vietravel, Peace Tour, Exotissimo-Cesais, Vitours and Buffalo Tours.
 
SHTP reports sharp export revenue increase

Most enterprises in Saigon Hi-Tech Park (SHTP) have gained a robust growth rate in both production and export value in the year to date, said the Authority of SHTP.

Firms attained a positive performance in January-September with the production value of US$631 million, up 163.2% against last year. The export value also soared to US$626.2 million, prompting a 165% year-on-year increase.

In particular, Intel Products Vietnam has exported products worth US$170 million.

This year SHTP has also issued licenses to eight new projects with total registered capital of US$151.2 million, increasing by 39.5% from last year. In all, 54 projects with investment capital of US$2 billion have been given the all-clear. SHTP has lured US$551.4 million over the past nine months.
 
IBM, Danang cooperate in building smarter city

IBM Vietnam on Monday inked a memorandum of understanding (MoU) on cooperation with Danang City’s Department of Information and Communications to build the central city into a smarter city.

IBM Vietnam’s general director Vo Tan Long said the cooperation will last five years to help Danang develop IT and telecom infrastructures and projects under IBM’s ‘Smarter City’ model. The two sides will focus on IT projects in challenging fields of traffic, water source management, food safety, information and communication, healthcare and high-tech industry.

Developing cities like Danang will face big problems such as traffic jams. IBM’s Smarter City solutions will collect data and information of the infrastructure situation, evaluate and analyze it to give forecasts for development demands within five or 15 years, Long said.

Every day, the traffic control system will suggest best routes for vehicles and give safety warnings to travelers, Long added.

For water source management, the model will control tap water supplying time for urban areas and residential areas to avoid losses. The system will also detect polluted water due to broken pipes, salinity intrusion and floodtide to help management bodies fix the problems soon.

Besides, IBM will provide solutions to trace food origins and give warnings on those from disease-hit areas.

Pham Kim Son, director of the city’s Department of Information and Communications, said IBM’s solutions would help solve the difficulties Danang will have to face. “We hope that the management system will help local authorities effectively control the problems,” Son said.
 
Developers continue to gauge market with high-end condos

The condo market in HCMC continued its downtrend in the third quarter of this year with the selling price of apartments declining across the board. As compared with other segments, the high-end condo projects are facing a tougher challenge in searching for buyers. However-, some developers keep moving their projects and launching their high-end apartments despite the market uncertainty.

Truong Minh Dat, deputy general director of Khang Nam Real Estate Investment Joint Stock Company, told the Daily that although the market remained challenging for property developers, the company felt confident to launch its apartments into the market as it saw a positive feedback in the first sale of its condo block developed nearby.

The company tried to attract homebuyers to its ongoing development high-end condo project named Terra Rosa – Luxury Condominiums by hosting an exhibition at the department store Diamond Plaza in downtown HCMC on Saturday. At the same time, the project developer announced to start selling first apartments of the project.

Dat said the company has set aside some VND300 billion to develop the Terra Rosa – Luxury Condominiums project located along Nguyen Van Linh Boulevard in HCMC’s District 7.

The project has 129 high-end apartments from 120 to 306 square meters, which are designed as duplex units so as to maximize spaces. Besides public facilities such as swimming pool, tennis court, fitness center and park, all apartments are designed with a swimming pool outside on the balcony.

The developer lists the selling price of the condo at nearly VND18 million per square meter, and applies a flexible payment method that allows buyers to divide their payment into 29 installments in a hope to ease the financial pressure on buyers.

Looking at the selling price per meter, one may think apartments in the condo project are at mid-end level; however, the total value of an apartment is rather high, from VND2 – VND5.5 billion per unit, because of its large space.

Dat expected his apartments would be accepted by the market thanks to typical design features, including private gym and swimming pool in each unit.

In July last year, Khang Nam launched a condo tower nearby with 366 apartments with prices staring from VND14.5 million per square meter. Some 90% of all the apartments are sold. That encourages the company to continue to gauge the market demand with new luxury apartments.

In another project, Phu My Hung Corporation has started launching 75 penthouses and 13 grounded apartments in Sky Garden 3 and Riverside Residence projects which are located in the new urban town Phu My Hung in HCMC’s District 7.

The company describes those apartments from 165 to 387 square meters as unique products because they are limited in units and having prime locations. However, the company has not yet announced selling prices of those apartments.

In July, the corporation marked its coming back to the residential market by launching a new condo project named Canh Vien 3 in the new urban town after two years of stopping its sale activities.

The project has two 13-storey buildings with 116 apartments from 119 square meters with average selling price offered at VND40 million per square meter.

Commenting on the residential market in the third quarter of this year, Marc Townsend, managing director of CB Richard Ellis Vietnam (CBRE), said the cash flow continued to be important in the market, and some individual investors are caught with the pressure of their loan interest rate which increased much higher than their anticipation. Many of them are trying to minimize their loss by selling out their already-bought apartments at a discount compared to the primary prices offered by developers.

According to CBRE, the number of apartments launched into the market decreased significantly in the third quarter of this year, dropping 82.5% against the previous quarter with some 860 units.

Prices in the secondary market continued to decrease across all segments, in which the luxury segment saw the largest declines of 2.3% q-o-q to US$4,230 per square meter, and high-end apartment decreased nearly 1% against the previous quarter to US$1,830 per square meter. Meanwhile, prices in the affordable segment declined a slight 0.1% both q-o-q and y-o-y to US$725 per square meter.

With the same view, Savills Vietnam in its market research said the affordable apartments with price ranging from US$550 to US$1,550 per square meter recorded the highest number of transactions in the last quarter. More than 70% of the units absorbed in the quarter belong to the affordable segment, while the high-end segment had an absorption rate of only 4%.

Market observers reckon that although the market received tentative signals of a reduced lending interest rate which may positively impact on the market, the purchasing power cannot increase immediately. Therefore, lower pricing and flexible payment terms will be used by developers to push sales in the coming time as many purchasers are waiting for further price reductions.

According to Savills, the HCMC condo market will see 13 apartment projects with some 3,400 new housing units to join the market in the next two quarters.

Labour market faces hard work

Small- and Medium-sized Enterprise Association statistics show that over 20 per cent out of more than 500,000 small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) across the country were dissolved and another 60 per cent of SMEs saw sagging revenue and had to lay off workers in the year to date.

Difficulties are particularly critical in labour intensive sectors such as the textile and garment industry. The salary hike, which started from October 1, sees enterprises’ payrolls augmenting by 30-40 per cent, plus a 15 per cent power price hike in early 2011 while transport costs were up 20 per cent, treated waste-water costs up 30 per cent. These factors have driven total input expenses up by over 20 per cent.

In the meantime, export orders nosedived 50-60 per cent and export prices lost 5-10 per cent.

Construction firms are in the same position. Escalating material costs caused delays to construction works and made thousands of labourers jobless.

In the wood sector, a survey by Vietnam Academy of Social Sciences’ Centre for Analysis and Forecast showed that sector businesses shed 30 per cent in size against the same period in 2010. Meanwhile, financial expenses such as borrowing costs and material costs hiked 25 per cent. Total expenses were up 30 per cent if salary hike was included where export orders just rose 5 per cent in value, making scores of firms shut up shop to avoid losses.

The situation was no better in traditional craft villages. By August 2011 the work volume and labourers’ incomes in craft villages dropped 60-70 per cent against 2010. Revenue figures for southern craft villages making handicrafts for export were down 50 per cent.

Similarly, many northern production workshops were out of work three months in the first eight months to reduce rising inventories.

Hiking rice export prices might endanger the domestic market.

According to the Vietnam Food Association (VFA), the Thai government’s rice price hike programme would result in surging rice export prices until the year’s end.

Vietnam’s rice export prices have jumped by around 60 per cent in the year to date. In the face of ongoing upward trend, the VFA has encouraged firms to continue export contracts but warned them of hoarding sufficient rice volumes before inking export deals.

VFA argued if Thai rice export prices at around $750-800 per tonne currently prove beyond the scope of importers, leading to stalled transactions, the Thai government would downwardly revise prices.

Reality shows that scores of firms inked low-pricing export contracts earlier, they then bought rice at higher costs to fulfill contracts, putting their backs to the wall.

“Up to 400,000 tonnes of rice in export contracts were cancelled in 2011’s third quarter and early October alone,” said VFA’s deputy chairman Pham Van Bay.

“Rice export prices may be soaring, partly propelled by Thai market situation and losing crops in many countries. However, it is unlikely for the world demand to hike sharply until the year’s end since there is no new movements from the part of our key importers Indonesia and the Philippines,” according to a Northern Food Corporation executive.

Indonesia might import more rice from Vietnam from February 2012. At that time the Thai government may wrap its high rice price purchases. Meanwhile, the Philippines may import Vietnamese rice later in the year, but not in a big quantity.

Besides, hiking rice export price at the onset of the flooding season brings concern of a price fever in the domestic market.

In fact, material rice currently fetches VND9,500 per kilogramme in the Mekong Delta, up VND400 per kg against September. The staple price in key markets such as Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City also rose slightly in past weeks.

Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (MARD) Plantation Department head Nguyen Tri Ngoc said Vietnam’s paddy rice output could amount to 41.5 million tonnes in 2011, sufficient to meet local and export demands.

VFA’s deputy chairman Pham Van Bay confirmed rice volumes would fully feed local demand and export orders as there was around 1.5 million tonnes rice in store and farmers are about to harvest the third rice crop.

“If a price fever occurs, VFA will instruct its member firms to sell rice 15 per cent lower than market rates to restore market order,” said Bay.

Project faces a rocky road

Ho Chi Minh City’s first build-transfer roading project may miss its completion target due to land acquisition woes.

Since construction kicked-off in June 2008, the Tan Son Nhat-Binh Loi-outer beltway route just finalised over 30 per cent of work as many problems persist with land acquisition. It will be difficult for the project to be completed as scheduled in 2012 as signed between developer South Korea-backed GS Saigon Company Limited (GSSD) and Ho Chi Minh City authorities.

According to the project’s Coordinating Committee, Ho Chi Minh City People’s Committee gave the thumbs-up for forming the build-transfer (BT) contract revision negotiation team led by the city’s Department of Planning and Investment.

The revision was aimed at supplementing and modifying project designs and including supplemental investment capital into contract appendix sections.

According to a Ho Chi Minh City Department of Planning and Investment representative, apart from former mutually agreed contract items, a new utilities trench section worth VND200 billion ($9.66 million) was recently added to the project’s contract.

The design, drafted by developer GSSD, was appraised by Ministry of Transport’s TEDI South but had not received feedback from competent state agencies, so that contract negotiations could not take place.

The 13.7 kilometre route starts from Tan Son Nhat airport’s Truong Son intersection and ends in Thu Duc district’s Linh Xuan intersection. Parallel to building road, the project requires the building of seven bridges.

According to the project’s Coordinating Committee chairman Bui Xuan Cuong, the committee asked the people’s committees in Go Vap, Tan Binh and Thu Duc where the route would run through to give relevant space to GSSD no later than November 2011 and the city’s people’s committee to decide who would take charge of land acquisition compensation for a land plot owned by Imexco Company in Thu Duc district.

Due to land transfer problems, only some project items could be completed in 2012 as scheduled such as Binh Loi and Go Dua bridge while completion dates of other items would be set latter.

Relative to project’s investment capital, the Coordinating Committee assumed the unit rates of project components would be the same as set in former cost estimation, the project value was set at $$291.866 million including site clearance cost in the BT contract inked in December 2007, though the project’s total investment capital might be hiked.

Vietnam, Japan establish dialogue mechanism in distribution, logistics

The Vietnamese Ministry of Industry and Trade and the Japanese Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry on October 10 signed a cooperation agreement to establish a policy dialogue mechanism in distribution and logistics.

The mechanism will enable the two ministries to share experiences and solutions relating to policies, regulations, standards and technical assistance in these two fields.

Under the agreement, the two sides will also exchange delegations and organise seminars and other activities for managers, associations, businesses and other related organisations in the fields.

The Japan External Trade Organisation (JETRO)’s latest survey said high costs and prolonged transport time were major shortcomings in the logistics services of Vietnam and other ASEAN members.

In addition to the lack of deep-water sea ports and incomplete road infrastructural facilities, Vietnam has not yet developed aviation cargo transport and its railway system has not yet connected to seaport and economic and industrial zones.

However, Vietnam has great potential for logistics service development as its export revenues are forecast to exceed $200 billion in the next decade.

JETRO’s survey also pointed to the multi-layered distribution system in Vietnam, pushing up the prices of goods and services. Therefore, the new policy dialogue mechanism is expected to help improve the situation, benefiting both businesses and consumers.

VTM Mobile launches comics and stories for smartphones
 
VTM Mobile has released comics and stories for smartphones after launching comics for feature phones.

The content of these comics and stories, prepared by an alliance of VTM Mobile, Youth Publishing House and famed Japanese author Hirata, is expected to provide a high quality product for Vietnam’s almost untapped e-book market.

While comics only have Vietnamese versions, stories will be available in English, Vietnamese and Japanese. Its Japanese Celsys technology has been developed over the past 10 years. From this technology, VTM Mobile has developed it for Vietnamese market, making digital stories become more familiar to Vietnamese users.

The programme has will run on every smartphone, as well as many other mobile devices which are using Flash and Java.

VTM Mobile is a subsidiary of VTM Group, a well-known name in software and IT servicing. It also has many advantages to approach story resources from Japan, as well as in negotiating copyrights with Japanese partners.

Going along with the rising trend of digital books, the demand for stories and comics in Vietnam is potentially huge.

VTM has been coordinating with domestic publishers and authors to publish 100 per cent Vietnamese stories and famous comics in Vietnam.

Not only aiming at the domestic market, VTM Mobile wants to enter the Japanese market which is expected to have digital turnover of $900 million in 2012, as well as English speaking countries.

Vietbuild 2011 opens in Can Tho

The third International Exhibition of Construction, Building Materials, Housing and Interior Decor (Vietbuild) 2011 opened in Can Tho on October 12.

The event attracts 300 units from 9 countries such as the Republic of Korea, Japan, Indonesia, China, Germany, Italy, Thailand, Malaysia and Vietnam.

There are 400 stalls displaying building materials, smart building designs, pottery products, solar energy systems and spare parts.

A seminar on environmentally friendly products, and advanced technologies, a “journey with businesses” forum and arts performances will also be held on this occasion.

The exhibition will last until October 16.

HCM City workshop urges trade facilitation measures

Vietnam must develop trade facilitation measures to enhance its export competitiveness, experts said a workshop held in Ho Chi Minh City on October 11.

Pham Minh Duc, senior economist at the World Bank in Vietnam, said that “an export-led growth model is still the most suitable strategy for Vietnam because exports are expected to boost productivity, bring technology transfer and become the magnet to FDI which contribute to growth.”

Trade facilitation depends on constant improvement in border and behind-the-border operations, transport infrastructure, logistics operations, customs and border management regulations and procedures.

Vietnam should further invest in infrastructure, enhance the participation of the private sector, and carry out modernization of customs procedures and a transparency campaign on zero tolerance of corruption.

According to the World Economic Forum’s Enabling Trade Index, Vietnam ranked 89 out of 118 countries, due to poor customs efficiency and transparency as well as a weak transport infrastructure.

Rising exports help narrow trade gap

Exports have risen 35.4 percent since the beginning of this year to US$70 billion, the Ministry of Industry and Trade (MoIT) told a conference in Ho Chi Minh City on October 11.  

The domestic export sector accounted for US$31.9 billion, up by a third, and foreign firms for US$38 billion, a growth of 37.5 percent.

The biggest export earners are plastics, textile and garments, footwear, iron and steel, machinery and equipment.

Vietnam’s exports to most markets rose. They were 170 percent higher in Africa and 41 percent higher in Asia.

Besides, with imports growing at a much slower rate of 26.9 percent, the country’s trade deficit has shrunk to just 9.8 percent, much lower than the Government’s 16-18 percent target set out in Resolution 11.

Exports during the rest of the year are expected to hit US$8 billion every month as a result of the Government’s measures to curb inflation, lower lending interest rates and maintain stability in the foreign exchange market.

MoIT proposed that the State Bank of Vietnam further reduce lending interest rates for businesses involved in production and trading and give priority to those buying agro-products for processing and exports.

For its part, the ministry pledged to implement the National Trade Programme to support exports and start a pilot project for export credit insurance soon.

Oil giant completes trifecta of business targets

The national oil and gas group, PetroVietnam, earned a total revenue of VND493 trillion in the past nine months of the year, reported its deputy general director Le Minh Hong at a meeting on October 11.  

Hong said the group has completed three business goals for the year ahead of schedule. These targets are related to revenue, contributions to the State budget and increases in oil and gas reserves.

Gross revenue is now equivalent to 98 percent of PetroVietnam’s yearly target and will likely reach its goal later this month.

So far this year, the group’s contribution to the State budget totaled VND16 trillion, a surge of 14 percent over its target for the whole year.

Hong also said the group has disbursed nearly VND60 trillion and postponed and rescheduled 56 projects worth VND7.25 trillion.

PetroVietnam’s general director, Do Van Hau, said to help ensure national energy and food security, the group will maintain safe operation of the oil and gas pipeline system, the Dung Quat oil refinery, Ca Mau 1,2 and Nhon Trach 1 power plants and the Phu My fertilizer plant.

He also said the group has cooperated with foreign partners to explore and exploit oil and gas overseas, with projects deployed in 13 countries, including Russia, Nigeria, Malaysia and Venezuela.

Firms urged to boost quality of financial staff

Talent management has been high on the agenda for chief finance officers (CFOs), according to a global study of best practices in talent management at businesses.

“Our findings showed that less than 20 percent of organizations have a talent strategy that fully integrated talent identification, development and retention activity across the finance team,” said president of the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA) Dean Westcott, speaking at a workshop on maximinising human resources in Hanoi on October 11.

Talent is define as high performing employees that have the potential to grow to critical roles at an accelerated pace.

The study jointly undertaken by ACCA and KPMG, showed that nurturing of talent was a concern as financial activities play a crucial role both in the private and public sectors and from multinationals to small and medium sized enterprises.

It also said securing the right talent was one of the biggest challenges CFOs faced.

A KPMG survey involving 500 senior finance executives found that more than half of respondents said that difficulties in finding and retaining skilled finance professionals are a major barrier to improving a firm’s performance.

It aimed to highlight the role that finance teams have played in generating a competitive advantage for a business.

John Ditty, KPMG”s General Director in Vietnam said macro trends  affecting talent management included generational change, globalization, a diverse workforce and changing nature of business.

He added that KPGM’s approach to talent management helped ensure talent is optimized and capable of provided the best return on investment. In addition, talent programmes need to be highly flexible and readily adaptable to changing market conditions and business needs.

PV