With 90.4 percent of the votes in favour, the National Assembly on Nov. 9 approved a Socio-economic Development Plan for 2012.

The overall objectives of the plan are to curb inflation, stabilise the macro economy and maintain the growth rate at a reasonable level; ensure social welfare and security, while improving the people's living conditions; maintain political stability, consolidate national defence, ensure national security, social order and safety, while integrating deeper into the world and improving the effectiveness of diplomatic activities.

For 2012, Vietnam has planned for a GDP growth of between 6-6.5 percent and a 13 percent increase in export turnover. It has also set the imbalance between imports and exports at between 11-12 percent.

Budget over-spending will be kept under 4.8 percent of GDP, the CPI will be kept below 10 percent and, it is hoped, 1.6 million new jobs will be created. Part of the plan is to keep the unemployment rate in urban areas capped at 4 percent.

At the meeting, deputies agreed that Government bond capital in the five years from 2011-2015 should be not higher than 225,000 billion VND (11 billion USD).

The National Assembly assigned the Government to develop principles and criteria for projects receiving investment from the State budget in the five-year period.

With 82 percent of votes in favour, the National Assembly approved a Resolution on the National Target Programme (NTP) for the five-year period of 2011-2015 with a total implementation budget of 276,372 billion VND (13.5 billion USD).

The 16 NTPs include those in employment and vocational training, sustainable poverty reduction, rural water supply and sanitation, population and family planning, food safety, culture, education and training, energy conservation and efficiency, climate change adaptation.

Their budget will come from the Central Government, local administrations and different stakeholders, including foreign capital and credits./.