At the Government’s September regular press conference (Photo: VNA)Hanoi (VNA)– Positive signs have been seen in the three areas of agriculture, industry,and service so far this year, while inflation was also controlled to under 4percent as targeted.
The comments were madeby Minister-Chairman of the Government Office Mai Tien Dung at the Government’sSeptember regular press conference in Hanoi on October 1.
He said that so far,all 12 national socio-economic goals have been completed, including eight surpassingtheir targets. Nine goals are predicted to be above the expectations of thefive-year plan, he added.
However, Dung remindedministries and sectors to keep a close eye on the complicated developments ofthe US-China trade war and stay vigilant, while paying more attention toadministrative reform and business condition reduction in order to complete allred tape cutbacks in October.
The Prime Ministerasked agencies to keep a close watch on indexes, especially macro indexesrelated to inflation, along with the economic restructuring and businesscompetitiveness enhancement.
According to theMinistry of Planning and Investment, international organisations forecast thatthe Vietnamese economic outlook will continue to be bright for the rest of theyear, with GDP growth predictions for the whole year varying at 6.6-6.9percent.
The consumer priceindex is likely to meet the year’s plan thanks to comprehensive measures inreining in inflation and creating favourable conditions for price management.
However, currentchallenges include a lack of major motivation for growth as the pressure ofinflation increases in the last months of the year.
A report from theMinistry of Planning and Investment showed that GDP in the first nine months of2018 expanded 6.98 percent, the highest nine-month rise since 2011.
The CPI continued tobe well controlled, with a rise of 0.59 percent month-on-month in September,and a 3.57 percent climb over the first nine months of 2018.
In the Jan-Septperiod, Vietnam enjoyed 5.39 billion USD of trade surplus, with 26 kinds ofgoods recording over 1 billion USD in exports and five exceeding 10 billionUSD.
Total socialinvestment increased 10.9 percent over the same period last year and accounted for34 percent of the GDP, while foreign direct investment rose 6 percent. Foreigncapital poured into share purchases and capital contribution deals also grew by36.8 percent.
Meanwhile, agro-forestry-fisheriessaw the highest nine-month growth in the 2012-2018 period, demonstrating the efficiencyof agricultural reform.
The processing andmanufacturing sector continued to affirm itself as a main driving force foreconomic growth, with nine-month rise of 12.65 percent – much higher than thesame period during 2012-2016, although still lower than last year’s figure.
Total retail andservice revenue was up 11.3 percent, while the number of tourists to Vietnamreached over 11.6 million, up 22.9 percent.
In the first ninemonths of 2018, 96,000 new enterprises were established with total registeredcapital of 963.4 trillion VND (41.42 billion USD), an increase of 2.8 percentin the number of firms and 6.7 percent in the amount of capital. Meanwhile,nearly 23,000 firms resumed operation, up 8.5 percent year-on-year. –VNA
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