Japan has flagged challenges Vietnam will
face during its rapid industrial development.
In a
letter sent to VIR last week as part of Japan commemorating the first
anniversary of March’s earthquake and tsunami, Japanese ambassador to Vietnam
Yasuaki Tanizaki said Vietnam was quite “ambitious” in trying to turn itself
into an industrial nation by 2020 with per capital of $3,000, under its
Socio-Economic Development Strategy 2011-2020.
Vietnam’s
biggest industrial development weakness was that 40 per cent of the country’s
gross domestic product was contributed by mineral exploitation and processing
industries, Yasuaki noted.
“Vietnam’s
staple exports are mainly raw ones like agricultural products and light industry
products. Meanwhile, in Thailand, export products with high added value like
computer or automobiles are on top of this nation’s export list,” he said.
Hanoi-based
Japan External Trade Organization underscored Vietnam’s underdeveloped
supporting industry as a big bottleneck for foreign firms. It said Japanese
manufacturers in Vietnam had to import 70 per cent of needed spare parts for
production in Vietnam.
Under
Decision 21/2011/QD-TTg, the government encourages the development of the
supporting industries for the sectors of mechanics, informatics and
electronics, automobile manufacturing and assembling, textiles and garments,
footwear and high technology, with special priorities about land lease and
operational fees.
Japan-based
Vietnam Investment Support Centre’s executive director Ryoichi Nakagawa said
these priorities failed to hit the mark. “More specific priorities need to be
announced. The government also needs to exempt import taxes for goods and
commodities imported as enterprises’ fixed assets,” he said.
While
Vietnam’s labour cost kept rising, if Vietnam’s supporting industries continues
being underdeveloped, foreign manufacturers of high added value products would
move to other foreign markets in search of low labour costs.
“This
will make Vietnam’s industrial development stagnant. Thus, it is imperative
that Vietnam renew its economic growth model and push up its economic
restructuring,” it read.
At
present, Japan’s government is cooperating with Vietnamese government’s Office,
the ministries of Planning and Investment, Industry and Trade and Finance to
help Vietnam make its industrialisation strategy until 2020 via selection of
key industries to be developed.
The
drafted shortlist of key industries comprises electronics, motorbikes,
shipbuilding, food processing, steel, petrochemicals, garment and footwear,
software, environmental friendly and energy saving equipment, automobiles,
heavy equipment and machinery and farming machines.
After a
final shortlist was finalised, a concrete action plan to realise this strategy
would be applied, said Hirofumi Miyake, counsellor of the embassy’s Economics
Section.
Thanh
Tung | vir.com.vn
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