VietNamNet Bridge – Viet Nam will take some "drastic" medium and long-term measures to create a foundation for sustainable development, Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung said yesterday, Jan 23.

Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung meets World Bank Country Director Victoria Kwakwa in Ha Noi.

He told World Bank Country Director Victoria Kwakwa that Viet Nam will this year continue efforts to stabilise the macro-economy, curb inflation, boost economic restructuring, achieve a higher economic growth rate and ensure social security.

He hoped Viet Nam's co-operation with the World Bank would further develop and be more effective in 2014.

He praised the bank's effective co-operation with and assistance to Viet Nam in the recent past, and said that even as it builds its internal strengths, the nation hopes to receive greater support from the international community as well as the WB.

For her part, Victoria Kwakwa congratulated Viet Nam on its achievements in 2013, saying they had helped improve the country's position and role in the global arena.

She also suggested Viet Nam take more radical measures to stabilise the macro economy, remove difficulties for production and trading activities, maintain a reasonable economic growth rate and ensure social welfare.

The World Bank would stand side by side with Viet Nam in implementing its development goals, she pledged.

The bank's Board of Executive Directors yesterday approved a credit of US$60 million to help strengthen Viet Nam's social welfare system through management innovations and improved service delivery. The innovations will be piloted in four provinces in Viet Nam's north, central and south.

The Social Assistance System Strengthening Project (SASSP) will focus its investment in poor children towards breaking the intergenerational transmission of poverty.

Source: VNS