A workshop to launch the Vietnam Annual Economic Report 2012 was held in Hanoi on May 24.

The report compiled by the Vietnam Centre for Economic and Policy Research (VEPR) provided analysis and comment on three economic restructuring programmes, focusing on public investment, state-owned enterprises and commercial banks, as well as difficulties and shortcomings during the implementation.

Director of VEPR, Dr. Nguyen Duc Thanh, said Vietnam’s economic growth rate in 2012 is likely to be 5.1 percent, the lowest ever since 2000 and the inflation rate, 6.2 percent..

In his opinion, the current growth model is highly dependent on ineffective State-run enterprises, which weakens economic effectiveness. The basic question of the macro-economy is to deal with bad debts in the commercial bank system and create conditions for the market to self restructure the enterprises, with the support of bankruptcy and merger and acquisition procedures.

The report recommended that Vietnam should have a clear view of the new development model, as well as suitable support mechanisms for successful implementation of economic reform and overcome the challenges posed by restructuring.

However, the World Bank gave a more optimistic forecast on Vietnam’s growth in 2012 with an inflation rate lower than 10 percent and economic growth of 5.7 percent.-VNA