A seminar looking at development models in Asia-Europe Meeting (ASEM) member countries after the global financial crisis started in the central coastal city of Nha Trang on April 26.

The seminar, hosted by the Central Institute for Economic Management (CIEM), has attracted more than 70 scientists and representatives from economic institutes, policy planning agencies and businesses in ASEM.

It is one of the initiatives on economic cooperation and development in ASEM initiated by Vietnam at the 9 th ASEM Foreign Ministers’ meeting last May. The initiatives were enthusiastically endorsed by the other members of ASEM.

At the seminar, the participants focused their discussions on three major issues – experiences in coping with the global financial crisis, ASEM’s geo-economic role and post-crisis development models, and commercial and investment cooperation in ASEM to achieve millennium development goals and sustainable development.

The outcomes of those discussions will be submitted to the ASEM Summit that is scheduled to take place in Brussels in October.

The global financial crisis wreaked havoc amongst global industries and businesses, said the participants, who all agreed that economic recovery had appeared after appropriate measures were introduced by individual governments as well as regional and world economic communities.

Associate Professor - Doctor Le Xuan Ba, the Director of CIEM, said that Vietnam had suffered from the negative impacts of the crisis, especially in trade and investment. However, thanks to the government’s opportune policy adjustments and measures to stimulate the economy, the country achieved an economic growth of 5.3 percent last year, said the economist.

This year, Vietnam ’s top priority is stabilising its macro-economy and making full use of global and regional economic recovery to maintain the momentum of its growth , added Ba.

The seminar will conclude on April 27./.