VietNamNet Bridge – There are currently opportunities for Vietnam to embrace stronger reforms to fuel economic growth; otherwise, the country will have to wait 10 more years to do it, economic experts said at a recent seminar in Hanoi.

Speaking at the seminar held by the Central Institute for Economic Management (CIEM), former Minister of Trade Truong Dinh Tuyen said macro-economic stability last year did not result merely from what the Government had done. Inflation was low, which was good, but it resulted from falling aggregate demand and low prices.

CIEM president Nguyen Dinh Cung said gross domestic product (GDP) growth beat the target of 5.8% last year but was still much lower than the average of 7% in previous years.

“There was an improvement in growth, but the growth rate was lower than in Laos, Cambodia and the Philippines,” Cung pointed out.

The quality of growth did not improve as total factor productivity (TFP) was even lower than in China, India and Indonesia.

Vietnam has not changed the fundamental drive for growth while the need to increase labor productivity is strong.

Cung said to achieve annual growth of 7% as targeted for the next five years, Vietnam should increase labor productivity to 6.4% from the current 4.1%. However, it is not easy to achieve labor productivity growth of over 6%.

Cung added Vietnam needs to reform its economic institutions.

“There are many reform opportunities and if we don’t grasp them, we would lose them and would have to wait another 10 years for such opportunities to return,” he said.

According to Cung, the Government needs to change the management methods and tools. For instance, it needs to set up independent watchdogs like the power supervision agency or separate the competition authority from the Ministry of Industry and Trade.

Cung’s view was shared by Tuyen and expert Le Dang Doanh.

Regarding legal documents, Cung said the huge number of legal documents like around 600 circulars and thousands of dispatches issued each year had caused unexpected policy changes. “This discourages enterprises from carrying out long-term investment plans. A minor change in a certain circular could make enterprises miss business opportunities,” he said.

SGT