Ho Chi Minh City, the nation's commercial hub, will keep its economic growth target for 2015 high at 9.5-10 percent and initiate several business-friendly measures to achieve it, Chairman of the municipal People's Committee Chairman Le Hoang Quan has said.
Addressing the 20th meeting of the HCM City Party Committee, which wrapped up on November 23, he said that his administration will focus on curbing difficulties facing the city's real estate market, supporting production, and attracting investment for developing support industries.
Quan said the city targets an 8 to 10 percent increase in export turnover and will raise public spending to 30 percent of GDP, compared with 28.5 percent in 2013.
The city will also continue to create favourable and equitable conditions for all economic sectors, mobilise official development assistance (ODA) for development, complete major infrastructure projects, and open up environment protection activities to the private sector, he said.
He informed the meeting that the city is set to achieve a GDP of 879 trillion VND (41.2 billion USD) this year, up 9.5 percent over 2013. Per capita income reached 5,131 USD in comparison with 4,520 USD in the previous year.
The municipal administration estimates that in 2014, retail sales and service turnover will post a year-on-year increase of 12.5 per cent, export turnover will rise 8.8 per cent year-on-year to $32 billion, and imports will rise 0.3 per cent over 2013 to $26 billion.
Quan also said that the city adopted market-diversification as a strategy to minimise negative impacts in some major import and export markets, adding the city has exported goods to over 200 countries and territories.
Despite its achievements, the city's economic growth has been relatively sluggish and its export growth is mostly based on processed goods with low added value, he conceded.
Small and medium scale businesses are still facing difficulties, and urban management is posing a daunting challenge. The city still lacks infrastructure its development demands, resulting in traffic congestion, jams, flooding and several environmental problems.
Quan also admitted that the city has not fulfilled its task of supplying sufficient clean water for its population while its hospitals remain overloaded, and food hygiene and safety management needs improvement.-VNA
