Vietnamese economy strives to overcome difficulties in 2024

It is halfway through 2023, and it is now time that the Government assigns ministries and localities to formulate the socio-economic development plan and budget for 2024.

According to previous estimates, the Vietnamese economy is expected to grow by 6.5% in 2023 and accelerate in 2024. However, the economy faced a great deal of challenges in the first half of 2023, with lower-than-expected growth, heaping more pressure on efforts to realise the full-year target. Economists have warned that Vietnam is not facing a short-term shock but internal and external difficulties that may continue to affect the economy in the years to come.

Reports by many ministries and agencies also show that the Vietnamese economy is facing more and more challenges, raising pressure on macroeconomic management. The volume of tasks that needs dealing with is becoming heavier when the authorities have to address both the weaknesses that have existed and remained unresolved for years and the issues that arise unexpectedly.

Furthermore, the risks in 2024 will not only come from global economic crisis or rising bankruptcies or increasing bad debt, but also from the ineffective implementation of economic reform measures.

In addition, bottlenecks such as power shortage is affecting enterprises’ business and production activities as well as the people’s lives, while reforms to improve the business climate and enhance national competitiveness have also stalled and could hinder economic recovery, which is already facing tough challenges.

It is worth noting that during this time, enterprises will look at macroeconomic signals to make their business decisions for the next year. In this context, the socio-economic development plan for 2024 must be formulated on the basis of complete and accurate assessment of the socio-economic development performance in the first half of 2023 and projections for the remainder of the year.

2024 will be the breakthrough year to complete the 2021-2025 five-year plan in the context that the economy has been hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic. The goals, orientations, and measures must be bolder and more effective, feasible, and suitable with the implementation capacity of ministries and localities. It is also necessary to mobilise and use resources effectively to overcome the difficulties and create substantive changes.