Government convenes teleconference with localities

Participants to the conference include Deputy Prime Ministers Le Minh Khai and Tran Hong Ha, Minister of Public Security To Lam, Minister of Defense Phan Van Giang and Vice President Vo Thi Anh Xuan.

The conference reviews the socio-economic performance in June and in the first half of the year, the implementation of the socio-economic development and recovery program, the allocation and disbursement of public investment capital, the implementation of three national target programs. 

The participants will give comments on the draft Resolution of the Government on removing difficulties for production and business, and discuss ways to step up administrative procedure reform and tighten discipline.

Addressing the event, Prime Minister Pham named difficulties and challenges facing Viet Nam over the first half of the year, remarkably six headwinds, including:

(1) Global economic recession and high inflation;

(2) Long lasting consequences of COVID-19;

(3) Geostrategic competition, protectionism, fragmentation, lack of cohesion;

(4) Conflicts threatening food security and global energy;

(5) Limited capacity of developing countries to adapt to and withstand external shocks;

(6) Climate change, natural disasters and epidemics.

However, Viet Nam's socio-economic development situations in June and in the second quarter of this year showed positive signs compared to the previous month and the previous quarter, respectively. 

Specifically, Viet Nam's GDP growth accelerated to 4.14 percent in the April-June period from 3.32 percent in the previous quarter. During January-June, Viet Nam's GDP expanded 3.72 percent.

The agro-forestry-fishery sector expanded 3.25 percent, contributing 8.53 percent of the total GDP; industry and construction up 2.5 percent (accounting for 23.63 percent); and service sector up 6.11 percent (making up 67.84 percent).

Total disbursed volume of foreign direct investment (FDI) reached US$10.02 billion in the first half of 2023, a year-on-year increase of 0.5 percent.

FDI inflows reached US$13.43 billion in the period, down 4.3 percent. 

The aforesaid figure includes US$6.49 billion poured in 1,293 newly-licensed projects, up 31.13 percent in terms of capital and up 71.9 percent in terms of the number of projects.

A total number of 632 projects increased investment capital by US$2.93 billion, while the volume of capital contributions and share purchases by foreign investors rose by 76.8 percent to US$4 billion.

The import and export turnover reached over US$316 billion after the first half of 2023. Of the figure, export turnover was estimated at US$164.45 billion while import turnover was estimated at US$152.2 billion.

Viet Nam received 975,000 foreign visitors in June, bringing the total number in the first half of 2023 to 5.6 million, jumping by 9.3 times from the same period in 2022. 

There were 13,904 newly established enterprises in June 2023, an increase of 4.8 percent over the same period in 2022. A further 7,098 enterprises resumed their operations in June, an increase of 215 percent over the same period in 2022.

In the first six months of the year, there were about 113,000 newly established and resumed enterprises. Thus, each month about 19,000 enterprises were set up or resumed operations./.