VietNamNet Bridge – A new class of Vietnamese with total assets of at least one million dollars emerged over the last 30 years.

Nguyen Xuan Thanh, director of the Fulbright Economics Teaching Program in HCM City, said the elite in Vietnam took shape after the average-income mechanism in the subsidy period was abolished.

After 1975, when the war ended, a centralized planning economic scheme began. However, there still existed market-ruled economic activities from unofficial businesses or household-run businesses.

Big money was earned from these types of business, resulting in the emerging class of very wealthy people.

Dang Van Thanh, former President of Sacombank, now the owner of a series of sugar companies, is one of them.

Thanh earned his wealth from his Thanh Thanh Cong Cooperative which traded alcohol and honey. The money was used by Thanh to build up Sacombank, which has become one of the largest Vietnamese commercial banks.

In the north, many people made money from petty trade. They bought goods somewhere and then sold them elsewhere to make profit from the price differences.

Some people got rich very quickly from trading foreign-made products. They bought products from the former Soviet Union and other socialist republic countries and then brought them to Vietnam for retail sale to consumers who favored foreign products. The money they earned was put into the finance and real estate market, and was used to set up businesses.

Many of the rich are those who started their business in Eastern Europe. They were workers or university students, who stayed in the countries after their work or study periods ended. After thriving successfully in the countries, they returned to Vietnam and injected their money into investment projects.

While they earned their first money in foreign countries from food and instant noodle manufacturing and trade, they are now becoming even more wealthy with investment projects in the banking and real estate sectors.

Thanh pointed out that this is an interesting feature which differentiates the Vietnamese rich and the rich in other Asian countries.

Meanwhile, some big businessmen started their businesses from the scratch. Though they are younger than many of those who described above, they have also been very prosperous.

This group includes Doan Nguyen Duc, president of Hoang Anh Gia Lai Group, which was formerly well-known as a big real estate developer, but now focuses on rubber and farm produce projects.

Le Phuoc Vu, president of Hoa Sen Sheet Metal Group, and Duong Ngoc Minh, president of Hung Vuong, Vietnam’s biggest seafood company, are also two well-known names.

Thanh said the state economic sector also helped produce wealthy people. Some of them were the directors of state-owned enterprises who continued to manage the enterprises after equitization.

Nguyen Thi Mai Thanh, chair of the board of directors and CEO of the Refrigeration Engineering Enterprise (REE), and Mai Kieu Lien, chair and CEO of Vinamilk, the nation’s leading dairy producer, are two examples.

Thanh Mai