Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) has observed an improvement in disbursement of funds for its projects in Vietnam in recent months, JICA Vietnam Chief Representative Tsuno Motonori has said.

The official noted Vietnamese Government efforts to increase public investment as part of the economic restructuring programme and its consistent emphasis on timely project completion.

“ JICA-funded projects have benefited from this general trend,” the JICA official said i n an interview with Vietnam News Agency’s Vietnam Plus website.

However, he raised the fact that the success of a number of projects in Vietnam has reflected the physical completion of these projects regardless of time and associated cost and it is rare to see a public investment project completed on time as scheduled.

“There are many reasons attributed to this but the most notable ones are site clearance, capacity of Executing Agency in project management including procurement, contract management, and coordination among stakeholders,” the JICA official said.

Now classified as a middle income country, Vietnam still needs huge investment for infrastructure development for sustainable growth since public investment is no longer sufficient.

In this sense, he noted that other investment forms, such as Public Private Partnership, are practical methods to attract more efficient investment.

“JICA has actively engaged in promoting the PPP model to attract more Japanese investors to Vietnam ,” the Japanese official said.

He also stressed the requirement of strengthening institutional capacity for efficient governance, with particular attention to public investment, to achieve quality growth, a necessity for economic sustainability.

Talking about the situation where inflation erodes achievements in economic growth and more importantly, in income and social equality, the JICA official said that Vietnam ’s current macroeconomic policy and actions taken to curb inflation are positive and monetary and fiscal policies seem to be more in harmony.

“The Vietnamese Government shall be determined and firm in the current direction of inflation control and implementation of structural reform to make the economy more competitive in the longer term,” he said.

Key issues to be addressed are the maintenance of macroeconomic stability, strengthening institutions to improve transparency, governance, efficient public expenditure and investment, and development of the private sector as factors for economic growth, the JICA chief said.-VNA