PM Khai says wants action on the economy
HANOI - Vietnamese Prime Minister Phan Van Khai has urged all ministries to
devise measures to boost industrial and export growth, the official Vietnam News Agency (VNA) reported on Friday.
Khai also called for strict monitoring of the exchange rate, for industrial projects to be managed properly and attention paid to agriculture output.
``The mobilisation of domestic capital and quick disbursement of foreign loans was also among measures sought by the prime minister to ease difficulties now facing Vietnam,'' VNA said.
VNA said Khai, Vietnam's reform-minded premier, made the call during a two-day cabinet meeting which ended on Thursday.
Recent economic statistics would have troubled Vietnam's communist leadership, foreign economists have said.
Estimated export growth was 13 percent for the first five months of the year with total shipments at $3.86 billion, from growth of 31.8 percent in the same period last year.
In addition, foreign investment approvals in the first four months were worth $1.07 billion from $5.1 billion in calendar 1997 and a total $8.6 billion in 1996.
The government did decide at the cabinet meeting to mobilise more capital for development investment, minimise the impact on exports from the regional economic downturn and try to reduce difficulties caused by insufficient jobs, VNA said.
However, no specific details on how the measures would be carried out were provided.
VNA said issues raised at the cabinet meeting -- usually held once a month -- also included slow implementation of government policies from the ministerial to the local level.
Hanoi adopted sweeping economic reforms in the late 1980s to stave off famine and financial collapse.
But foreign businessmen and some economists have accused the government of dragging its feet on new economic initiatives. They have also said the non-convertible dong currency was overvalued.
On issues such as the reform of inefficient state-owned firms, Vietnam has said it would proceed at its own pace.
The International Monetary Fund and the Asian Development Bank have predicted gross domestic product growth of five percent in Vietnam this year. The economy grew 8.8 percent in 1997.
REUTERS, May 29, 1998.
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