Dau Anh Tuan
Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry
Vietnam has recorded impressive achievements in the cause of national renewal over the past years. The emergence of the Enterprise Law in 1999, with the main thrust of simplifying market entry procedures, has led to a boom in the number of private businesses, which increased nearly 20 times from 30,000 to more than 600,000 over 15 years. The country has been included in the world’s top exporting countries with such products as textiles and garments, leather and footwear, and agricultural and aquatic products like rice, coffee, pepper, shrimp, fish, etc. With a legal system that promotes foreign investment, Vietnam has quickly become an attractive destination for foreign investment reaching tens of billions US dollars per year. The country has drawn for itself a valuable experience during nearly 30 years of implementing the renewal and open-door policy, that is, open and favorable policies will create a momentum for the development of the private sector and the economy as a whole.
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| Representatives of the Foreign Investment Agency and Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation sign MoU for Japanese investment in Vietnam__Photo: Danh Lam/VNA |
However, according to the World Economic Forum (WEF)’s Global Competitiveness Report 2014-2015, Vietnam ranked only 68th. Worriedly, the country remained weak in the institutions and innovation pillars. In the institutions pillar, Vietnam took the 92nd position globally and the second-lowest position (above Myanmar) out of 10 countries in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). In the innovation pillar, Vietnam was on the 87th place globally. The quality of education is very important for the institutions and innovation pillars but, like in previous years, Vietnam’s higher education and training pillar ranked only 96th though its health and primary education pillar took the 61st position. Also, the country’s technological readiness ranked 99th, meaning that the competitiveness of Vietnamese businesses can hardly improve in the immediate future...
