The
basic economic indicators of Vietnam are much worse than that of other
economies, though Vietnam and the other economies are in the same international
context.
The difficulties which exist in 2011 would
repeat in 2012, and they would be even worse, economists have warned.
High
inflation
Tran Dinh Thien, Head of the Vietnam Economics
Institute, said at the workshop on the prospect of Vietnam's economy in 2012
held in HCM City several days ago that the economic growth slowdown, high
inflation rate, big trade deficit and budget deficit are the
"heritages" left by the year 2011 for 2012.
Thien said that the situation has been lasting
for many years, which has caused the "spiral of stagnancy"-- heavy
investment has been made, the growth rate has slowed down, while the inflation
rate has increased.
Commenting about the Ministry of Planning and
Investment's forecasting that the GDP would grow by 6 percent in 2012, and the
inflation rate would be lower than 10 percent, Thien said that the factors that
support the high GDP growth in 2012 prove to be weaker than the previous years.
The report on Vietnam's economic activities
and the prospect in 2011-2012, released by Standard Chartered Bank recently
also pointed out that in 2012 the government of Vietnam will have to face the
same challenges like in previous years - the pressure on the dong value, the
requirement to control the credit growth.
The challenges may become even more serious
due to the difficulties of the global economy and the fluctuations in exports.
The institution has predicted that the real
GDP of Vietnam would increase by 6.3 percent in 2012 and 6.5 percent in 2013.
Meanwhile, the inflation rate is thought to decrease to 19.7 percent in
December and to one-digit rate by the end of the second quarter of 2012. It is
expected that the inflation rate would be 11.3 percent in the whole year 2012
and 8 percent in 2013.
Standard Chartered Bank thinks that the
inflation rate would return to the one-digit level by the end of the second
quarter of 2012. However, the inflation decreasing would be not enough for
Vietnam to loosen the monetary policies in the time to come, because the
pressure on the dong value still exists.
The bank still believes that the dong may
continue losing its value in 2012 because of the current account deficit and
the low foreign currency reserves.
In a recent research on Vietnam's economy, ANZ
predicted that the inflation rate in Vietnam may reach 18-19 percent this year.
ANZ believes that the inflation rate would be
at two-digit level by the end of the year, which means that the high inflation
would remain the main challenge for Vietnam in the next 12 months.
ANZ's Chief Economist of Asia Pacific said at
a workshop in HCM City last week that the key interest rates would be
maintained at the current levels until the first half of 2012, and that the
interest rates would only be eased when the inflation rate decreases to
one-digit level.
He went on to say that Vietnam needs to
anticipate the risks if it loosens the monetary policies too soon. ANZ
predicted that the refinancing interest rate would be 13.3 percent by the end
of 2011, 12.5 percent in 2012, while the consumer price index CPI would
increase by 18.7 percent in 2011 and 13.8 percent by the end of 2012.
Talking about what Vietnam should do in 2012,
Thien said that the government should prioritise to ease the inflation, while
it should not pay too much attention to obtain high GDP, adding that the
targeted GDP growth rates should be 3-4 percent, or 5 percent at maximum.
Exchange
rate still is a challenge
According to Standard Chartered, after a
period of increasing in value (from May to July), the dong now has to face new
challenges. The actual dong/dollar exchange rate on the market has once again,
climbed to the levels higher than the ceiling levels, now hovering around
21,450 dong per dollar.
International experts think that though the
government of Vietnam can keep the exchange rate stable by the end of the year,
but the dong may lose its value again in 2012.
VietNamNet
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