The country’s economy reached a growth rate of 8.4 per cent last year. For all that, the recent 10th National Communist Party Congress has set an economic growth rate of 7.5-8 per cent per year for the five years to come. In your opinion, why can’t we lengthen our pace?
In my opinion, at this point in time, we need to focus on the rapid and sustainable development of the economy with importance being attached to the quality of development. I want to stress that speed does not directly create quality, but sometimes it is quite the reverse. Speed can create conditions and forces for quality improvement. But it is quality itself that creates speed. Our situation now is because of low quality so that speed is not high enough. Therefore it is most appropriate to strive to achieve high quality so as to reach high speed.
We can set a higher economic development target if we sacrifice other targets of social development and environmental protection. If we swap things this way the economic growth rate will rise in the immediate future, but it will be very difficult to maintain the growth rate in five subsequent years. Effort and expenses for restoring the environment will be far heavier than money spent on the protection of the environment.
After all, a new feature of the 10th Congress is that it showed three dimensions of growth: high economic growth rates, cultural and social development, and environmental protection. According to the current new conception of sustainable growth and in General Secretary Nong Duc Manh’s speech at the celebration of the Party’s 75th founding anniversary, three other sustainable growth factors were mentioned, which were human development, cultural development and greater democratisation. So, today’s sustainable development requires six dimensions, but not merely three dimensions.
It is necessary to affirm that over recent years, Vietnam has overcome many difficulties and challenges, and achievements made were worthy of note, including rapid continued economic growth, socialist-oriented market economy that has been built to some extent, international economic integration gaining significant steps and the country’s international position has been raised to an evidently higher level.
However, Vietnam’s per capita income reached only $640 in 2005 while $765 is the threshold nations need to pass to escape the status “a low-income developing nation”. According to economists, among development factors, the capital factor accounts for as much as 60 per cent while the labour factor only 20 per cent and other factors of science and technology including management represent only 20 per cent.
The proportion of high technology used in industry in Vietnam is 20 per cent, far lower than in other regional countries. Even the capital factor, Vietna’s total capital mobilised from the society for development investment purposes amounts to nearly 39 per cent of GDP. According to economists, this figure almost reaches its limits and it is hard to raise it much higher. Meanwhile, regarding the environment, Vietnam reached only 42.3 points in the sustainability index in 2005, ranking eighth among ASEAN countries, falling below Myanmar, Laos and Cambodia.

In the system of synchronised orientations and measures, what are the ones expected to have a breakthrough in the next five years?
Over more than a year, similar questions have been asked. In the documents of the 10th Congress one idea was brought up. It was focusing on public, social, cultural, educational and health services in order to develop the service sector outstandingly. But in fact it is not a simple matter.
In my opinion, for more than a decade, we have been concentrating on renovating the economy, and for the next five years, we will focus on social renovation. In recent years, we focused on renewing the management method, separating state management from production and business, and for the coming five years we will separate administrative control from management of the service sector.
The proportion of services accounts for only 38 per cent in the GDP structure while it is far higher in other regional countries. That is why radical renovation of the management mechanism and the method of providing public services is an important breakthrough in the process of liberalising the cultural and social fields to a new development level. However, as public services relate directly to people’s life and is an important factor contributing to stabilising society, changing the mode of providing these kinds of services must be done under a synchronised scheme and a suitable roadmap.

You have also mentioned policies on agriculture, farmers and rural areas, and creating an appropriate investment environment for various forms of business as indispensable requirements for the sustainable development goal which you rate as a particular feature of the coming five-year development period. At this point of time, what do you expect from the coming five-year period, based on the current climate?
Since 1986 we have always rated ourselves as an underdeveloped country. Of the four avowed dangers there is the danger of lagging behind further. To avoid lagging behind further, there are many thresholds to pass. My greatest expectation is that this time we pass a threshold on the road to recovery from falling further behind. That is part of the effort to escape the status of a low-income developing country.
The World Bank has set a new annual criterion of $950 per capita for low-income countries by 2010. If we can reach the goal proposed at the 10th Congress of about $1,050-1,100 per capita, we will pass the threshold of low-income countries to join the group of medium-income countries. It is not an expectation of mine alone, but it is a specifically important threshold that is expected by every single Vietnamese person on the way to fighting lagging behind and lagging behind further than other countries.

At the 10th Congress, many said that a golden opportunity for Vietnam to make outstanding progress in development has appeared as they believed history repeated itself 20 years after the 6th Party Congress in 1986 initiated the renovation process in Vietnam. Have you any comments to make on this?
There are sufficient opportunities to pass the low-income threshold in the next five years, in terms of both internal and external affairs. Concerning domestic affairs, we have an accumulation of wealth and preparations made over many years in the areas of physical installations, preparations in terms of mechanisms, policies, and human resources. In the area of external affairs, it can be said that we have never had such a favourable environment, and according to many, we have a golden opportunity to seize.
The remaining questions are whether we are able to bring into play the internal and external factors that we have created and will be able to create, and whether we are able to make the most of the opportunity which we created from outside. And more importantly, can we combine both internal and external opportunities to generate an excellent force in the five years to come or not? All is still unknown. But I believe we can make it.
Besides, in my opinion, what we need to know is that integration is an opportunity, which is full of risks. Overcoming risks means turning challenges into good opportunities.
It is the same concerning internal affairs. The people are very excited about the renovation process and socioeconomic development. If we cannot make the most of this opportunity we will cause trouble for ourselves.

There is still the issue of state economy as the key player. Opinions differ about this issue. But it seems a question is being asked about common thinking. Have you any comments?
While Vietnam is opening its doors, we must play a dual role - creating and opening the market. We will proceed with these two stages in parallel and need state support. Here, the role of the State is not only concerned with power, but also state economy.
In the initial period of the market economy, in many fields the private sector would not have developed as today if not the momentum generated by the State economy or loans from the State to invest in infrastructure. The fundamental and decisive role here is that of a “midwife” who provides guidance on sustainable development. However, anything excessive is inadequate. The State follows the slogan “the State encourages the private sector to do what private people are able to, but the State sector is obliged to do what the State can do better”. When the State is doing business, the State economy and State enterprises should compete on an equal footing in the market. The issue of ownership, in my opinion, is not the kernel of the thing. What is really important is how to conduct business operations.

Source: Vietnam Investment Review, No.706-2006