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Better to keep cautious optimism: Expert
While government agencies give optimistic predictions about Vietnam’s economic recovery in the near future, acting Director of the Economic Institute Tran Dinh Thien says that it would be better to keep a cautious optimism as economic uncertainties still exist in the world.
Some experts say that Vietnam’s economy has begun recovering and regaining growth. Do you think that the experts prove to be too optimistic with the conclusion, as there are many negative forecasts about the world’s economic performance in the time to come?
Vietnam’s economy has shown signs of recovery, beginning a rise up in January, February, March and April, and we hope that the tendency will continue in the time to come. However, while we are optimistic, we should also pay attention to warning factors. The world’s economy remains in uncertainties, and there exist factors which may badly affect Vietnam’s economy.
It seems that the latest forecasts about the world’s economy show gloomier pictures, while Vietnam, a highly-open economy, has been relying on the world’s economy.
Meanwhile, we still cannot measures exactly the important indicators of the national economy, especially business’ statuses and purchasing power.
There have been signs about the better situation of employment. However, we still cannot measure all the influences on employment in trade villages, which have been suffering from the lower demand of export markets.
Moreover, import turnover in the first four months of the year decreased by 41% over the same period of last year, which means that input materials for production will be lower in the next quarters of the year. The 41% decrease in import turnover proves to be a big figure, equal to 35% of total GDP of Vietnam.
Meanwhile, the export decreases show that Vietnam’s export markets have not recovered yet.
You have pointed out a lot of factors which may have bad impacts on Vietnam’s economy. Why do state agencies and independent experts still give optimistic forecasts?
We have a lot of advantages which have been mentioned in the last time. For example, the agriculture sector is believed will enjoy advantages.
In the government’s demand stimulus packages, the high determination can also create confidence. And as you see, the confidence has been clearly restored as we heard at recent workshops.
Another reason is the actual efficiency of the demand stimulus packages. Of course, we should not expect that the packages will bring the desired effects immediately.
You may have heard that some experts do not believe in the efficiency of the loan programmes. Many enterprises have been using the money they borrow under the interest rate subsidy programme to pay old debts, which is called ‘debt turnover’. What do you think about that?
In ‘debt turnover’, businesses liquidate old debts before the debts become mature, in order to get new loans.
I have to remind you that we are in abnormal conditions, so we need uncommon measures.
I think that we should allow some enterprises, not all of them, to implement the ‘debt turnover’. It is necessary to find out which enterprises deserve this. I mean that we should allow ‘debt turnover’, but with conditions. We need to provide a way out for businesses. The businesses that need to be allowed to perform ‘debt turnover’ should be the ones which have potential for development and feasible business projects. High inflation and high lending interest rates are not the fault of businesses, but they have made them suffer.
vietnamnet, vnmedia
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