Illustrative image (Source: VNA) Hanoi (VNA) – Orientations aimed at speeding up the restructuring process of Vietnam’s economy amidst the Fourth Industrial Revolution was the focus of a workshop held by the National Centre for Socio-economic Information and Forecast (NCIF) and the Ministry of Planning and Investment in Hanoi on November 22.
It was an open forum for domestic and foreign scientists, experts, and managers to discuss and announce the latest studies on Vietnam's economic restructuring in general, and some specific sectors, in the context of the Fourth Industrial Revolution.
In his opening speech, Director of the NCIF Tran Hong Quang said that the digital revolution is happening fast with a strong impact on all aspects of the economy, adding that Vietnam’s economic growth model is still based on the exploitation of natural resources, the assembly and manufacturing industry, and production and export of labor-intensive and low-skilled sectors.
He underlined the need for each sector to make careful preparations in order to make full use of new opportunities and to minimise the challenges arising from the revolution.
Luong Van Khoi, Deputy Director of NCIF, said that the restructure of Vietnam’s economy for the 2016-2020 period has focused on changing the composition and ability of the economy; improving the efficiency of the use of social resources, labour productivity, and economic competitiveness; and gradually modernising individual economic sectors.
Attention has been given to forming a more rational and dynamic economic structure, and extensively promoting the growth transformation model.
Le Huy Khoi, from the market research and forecast division of the Industrial Policy and Strategy Institute (IPSI) under the Ministry of Industry and Trade, highlighted some of the opportunities from the revolution for the industry and trade sector. He said that it will create motivation for enterprises to change their mode of production and business, as well as boost innovative production and market thinking towards increasing productivity and the quality of labour force in industrial production.
In particular, the revolution will also promote innovative capabilities in industrial production thanks to the application of new technologies.
He, however, also pointed out some of the revolution’s challenges to the industry and trade sector, saying that the Vietnamese business community’s awareness and concern towards the revolution is limited.
Moreover, technical infrastructure and information technology application, along with internal weaknesses in enterprises operating in the industry and trade sector hinder them from taking full advantage of Industry 4.0.
Economic experts said it is necessary to widely promote the mobility, opportunities, challenges, and impact of the revolution, as well as fine-tune the institutional system towards fostering the development of the digital economy and investment liberalization so as to tap opportunities from the revolution.
Conor O'Toole from Ireland’s Economic and Social Research Institute, emphasised that it is necessary to build important policies for economic restructuring in Vietnam.
More attention should be paid to education and training, especially in science and technology; ensuring a stable investment environment and effectively managing public finance; and increasing investment for infrastructure development and IT application. –VNA
VNA
