Prof. Krugman: Vietnam’s economic strategy on right track

Amidst the global financial crisis and economic downturn, Vietnam’s economic strategy has proven to be on the right track, said Prof. Paul Krugman.

Krugman, who won the 2008 Nobel Prize for Economics, stated this at a seminar, entitled “The global economy in the post-financial crisis period: Recommendations for Vietnam ’s development strategy,” which was hosted by the Foreign Ministry in Hanoi on May 22.

The professor said Vietnam should not be too hasty as its economy will need time to recover, but it would continue to develop rapidly again after 3-4 years.

Krugman, who was described as one of the world’s 20 most influential people by the Time magazine, p raised Vietnam ’s efforts to achieve an annual average growth rate of 8 percent during previous years.

In the years to come, Vietnam should focus on strengthening its education system, speeding up the development of its infrastructure and upgrade its financial and banking industries. This would prevent another possible crisis, he stressed, adding that Vietnam can learn from the experiences of other countries.

Deputy Prime Minister Nguyen Sinh Hung, who chaired the workshop, said that Vietnam is not yet out of the range of impacts that could still arise from the global economic recession. It needs to be able to respond quickly and use different policies to weather the current crisis, he noted.

The Vietnamese Government is always looking for the opinions of others, particularly those proposed by the world’s leading economists, considering them a source of useful information to work out ways of dealing with the crisis, the deputy PM stressed.

At the seminar, the participants looked at how the financial crisis and economic slowdown might develop in the near future and analysed the efficiency of measures that some nations, especially other Asian countries, have adopted to get over the current difficult times.

Local policymakers were keen to learn Prof. Krugman’s suggestions for the country’s socio-economic development strategy for the 2011-2020 period.

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