NA aims for overspending below 3.5% of GDP by 2020

NDO/VNA—State budget overspending will be reduced to below 3.5% of GDP by 2020, while public debts, government debts and the country’s foreign debts will not exceed 65%, 54% and 50%, respectively, of annual GDP in 2016-2020.

State budget overspending will be reduced to below 3.5% of GDP by 2020. (Credit: NDO)
State budget overspending will be reduced to below 3.5% of GDP by 2020. (Credit: NDO)

These goals were set in the resolution on the economic restructuring plan in 2016-2020 adopted by 82.39% of National Assembly deputies during their plenary session in the afternoon of November 8.

Existent non-performing loans in the national economy will be curbed to below 3%, while the capitalisation of the stock market and the bond market will make up 70% and 30% of GDP, and at least 1 million businesses will be set up by 2020, among other goals.

The resolution stressed the need to closely follow the Party’s guidelines and policies, especially the Twelfth Party Central Committee’s Resolution 05-NQ/TW, dated November 1, 2016, to build a growth model measured by labour productivity and the quality and competitiveness of the national economy and to mobilise, allocate and use resources efficiently based on the market’s signals and rules.

The quality of growth should be enhanced and the growth model, which used to rest on investment and exports, should be gradually refocused on investment, exports and the local market. It should be assessed on the productivity and quality of labour and scientific and technological applications and innovations, the resolution said.

Internal resources should be fully tapped in combination with attracting and using external resources efficiently. Macroeconomic stability must be maintained and economic growth must go along with social advancement, progress and justice, defence, security, ecology, scientific and technological applications, human resources quality and workforce restructuring, the document stressed.

The implementation should keep abreast with the market life, and the development of the private sector should be regarded as an important driving force in economic development.

The resolution also mentioned tackling problems that existed in the previous economic restructuring period to lessen their effects on socioeconomic achievements.

The economic restructuring should be coupled with reshuffling the administration, stepping up administrative reforms and improving the quality of public services.

The country’s free trade agreements should be soundly implemented to proactively make the best use of Vietnam’s international integration and the fourth industrial revolution to ensure economic growth is well associated with environmental protection and recovery and climate change adaptation, the resolution emphasised.

Key tasks were also identified, including restructuring public investment, state-owned enterprises and credit organisations; rearranging the State budget and the public sector; promoting the development of the private sector and reeling in foreign direct investment; modernising the planning and structuring of sectors and economic zones with regard to increasing productivity, quality and efficiency and speeding up international economic integration; forming and developing various markets, including the finance market, the land-use rights market, the labour market and the science and technology market in a uniform fashion.