Thanks to the impressive achievements, Vietnam has been highly appreciated by the international community for its ability to cope with the epidemic as well as its efforts to maintain momentum in economic growth and ensure social security.
The Government has established many policies to support enterprises and people who are affected by the pandemic, including monetary, financial, social security and electricity price aid packages worth around VND300 trillion (over US$12.7 billion), VND180 trillion (over US$7.6 billion), VND62 trillion (over US$2.6 billion) and VND11 trillion (nearly US$468 million), respectively. As the epidemic situation improving and it is not known when the epidemic will end, restarting the economy is especially necessary to help people’s lives return to normal soon.
According to the Government's direction, the scenarios for the post-epidemic economic recovery have been developed and implemented at all levels, based on three groups of criteria for the level of Covid-19 spread (high, medium and low risk). Accordingly, synchronous measures will be taken to ensure the dual goals of safely controlling the epidemic and regulating the “economic spring” to rebound at the right time, in the right direction and with high efficiency. Therefore, it is crucial to prioritise the identification and timely change of thinking and methods of State management and business administration under the new spirit of “living with the epidemic” and “safe business”.
Localities and enterprises should focus on agricultural development and re-herding while proactively adjusting production and business plans, facilitating and limiting disputes for the signed economic contracts. In addition, they should improve links, re-arrange and overcome the failures of macro and microeconomic supply chains, as well as increase aggregate supply and social demand, towards promoting the domestic market and production to replace imports with the motto of “Vietnamese people give priority to using Vietnamese goods” and “Vietnamese goods conquering Vietnamese consumers”. It is essential to thoroughly grasp and apply the trends and achievements of the fourth industrial revolution to enhance digital transformation activities and accelerate platform economy and non-contact services; boost online processing of public services; and develop the applications to support the forms of working online, e-learning, e-commerce and cashless payments.
In order to maintain the economic growth target from now until the end of the year, regardless of any scenario, the relevant agencies should improve the practical investment and business environment; speed up the disbursement of public investment; prevent monopoly and group interests and blow national aspirations with the spirit of putting national interest first and drastically controlling negative acts, corruption and waste; respect talents and take advantages of opportunities from the new free trade agreements; and enhance trade promotion. Meanwhile, the enterprises must take the initiative in the supply of raw materials and production of components and intermediary goods; improving their capacities through support measures related to finance, credit, human resources, creative innovation and market development; and promote the links between producers, distributors, banks with businesses.
Although it is not possible to immediately return all activities to their normal orbits, people can believe that Vietnam will continue to defeat both the new coronavirus and the “stagnation virus” thanks to the solidarity and sharing spirit of the whole community. Vietnam has been assessed by the Asian Development Bank (ADB) as one of the countries with the fastest economic growth in the Southeast Asia region in 2020 and Vietnam’s economic growth momentum will return in 2021 with an expected rate of 7.3% as forecast by the credit ratings agency Fitch. The initial positive results in the fight against Covid-19 pandemic have shown the strength of Vietnamese bravery and intelligence that was considered to be an important premise and a solid platform for the country to quickly stabilise the people’s life, restore the production and business, towards rapid and sustainable development goals in the future.
