Remarks by General Secretary, President To Lam at Cabinet meeting

Distinguished Leaders of the Party, the State, the Viet Nam Fatherland Front, the Government, and Central Party Commissions, Ministries, and Sectors,

Leaders of provinces and centrally-run cities joining via video teleconference,

Representatives of domestic and foreign business associations and enterprises, and delegates

Today, I am highly pleased to attend the national virtual conference between the Government and localities to review the achievements and limitations of the first six months of the year, and to deploy tasks and solutions for the remaining six months and the period ahead. On behalf of the leadership of the Party and the State, I extend my warmest greetings and best wishes to all comrades.

Comrades,

The year 2026 marks the inaugural year for implementing the Resolution of the 14^th National Party Congress and serves as the launchpad for the country's new phase of development. This requires the entire political system to act with the utmost drastic urgency to generate distincttive breakthroughs in national development, while enhancing the resilience of the economy and elevating the actual living standards of our people.

We deployed our tasks for the first half of the year against a backdrop of a global economy fraught with difficulties, alongside rising geopolitical, energy, and trade risks. These factors have directly impacted highly open economies like Viet Nam. Conflicts in the Middle East and U.S. tariff policies have driven up oil prices, freight rates, and production costs, exerting immense inflationary pressure. The outlook for global trade remains challenging and highly uncertain, while global investment flows are shifting according to new criteria.

Nevertheless, the achievements recorded in the first six months of the year are highly commendable. This is the fruit of the joint efforts of the entire political system, the business community, and people nationwide. I particularly acknowledge the efforts of the Prime Minister, the Government Leadership, and the Ministers of the 16^th tenure. Despite having assumed office for less than three months, they have introduced innovative perspectives in leadership, guidance, and governance, employing creative, scientific, decisive, and timely approaches that have yielded practical results.

I would like to summarize six prominent achievements:

First, the macroeconomy remained fundamentally stable, and inflation was kept under control amid rising global inflation and substantial pressure, with the average consumer price index (CPI) for the first six months estimated to rise by 4.5 percent. Economic growth maintained its positive momentum. The manufacturing, processing, construction, services, tourism, and export sectors all witnessed positive shifts. Second-quarter GDP growth was estimated to increase by 8.39 percent, bringing the six-month growth rate to 8.18 percent.

Nine localities—accounting for approximately 18.6 percent of the country's GDP—recorded double-digit growth, namely Ha Tinh, Ninh Binh, Hai Phong, Bac Ninh, Hung Yen, Phu Tho, Quang Ninh, Thai Nguyen, and Tay Ninh. State budget revenue in the first half of the year reached approximately 62 percent of the estimate, representing a 17.2 percent year-on-year increase, even after implementing tax exemptions and reductions totaling VND89 trillion. Total import-export turnover surged by 27.1 percent, exceeding US$550 billion. Foreign direct investment (FDI) remained a bright spot, and the number of newly established and returning enterprises outpaced those exiting the market, reflecting the confidence of businesses and investors in the country's development prospects.

Second, breakthroughs in infrastructure development. Strategic infrastructure projects were launched concurrently. Housing policies introduced new, well-aligned orientations, including the development of rental housing, affordable housing, and social welfare housing. Long-standing, backlogged cases and projects were resolutely addressed; specifically, a comprehensive review and classification were conducted to propose jurisdictions and handling options to 3,438 out of 4,606 troubled projects.

Third, institutional refinement, administrative reform, and the removal of bottlenecks were driven with greater resolve. Efforts to reduce compliance time and costs, resolve project bottlenecks, and optimize the decentralization mechanism alongside the operation of the two-tier local government system have become increasingly seamless and effective. These efforts have progressively unlocked development resources, yielding an estimated 53 percent reduction in compliance time and a 55 percent reduction in compliance costs.

Fourth, science, technology, innovation, and digital transformation made continuous strides, particularly in the development of data infrastructure, digital infrastructure, strategic technologies, and digital economic sectors. The National Data Center has officially commenced operations. Project 06 was innovatively and vigorously implemented, creating a spillover effect across almost all sectors, fields, and aspects of social life. Both the quantity and quality of online public services were enhanced.

Fifth, socio-cultural fields received continued attention, particularly regarding care for meritorious individuals, poor households, vulnerable groups, education, healthcare, and public livelihoods(nearly VND90 trillion in policy credit supported over 1.2 million households and beneficiaries, and funding was secured to ensure the statutory base salary increase starting July 1). The construction of 229 inter-level boarding schools in border communes was initiated. Efforts in new human resource training, healthcare, environmental protection, and the search and gathering of martyrs' remains were actively deployed, particularly the 500-day-and-night Campaign to locate, gather, and identify the remains of fallen soldiers.

Sixth, national defense and security were firmly maintained; foreign affairs and international integration continued to expand, contributing to elevating the country's standing and opening up new development spaces (in the first six months, Viet Nam upgraded and elevated relations with six countries, bringing the total number of partners at the comprehensive level or higher to 45 countries).

On behalf of the Party and State leadership, I commend the Government, ministries, sectors, localities, the business community, and people nationwide for their dedicated efforts to overcome adversity—simultaneously responding to external volatility while executing new, difficult, and unprecedented tasks. This forms a vital foundation as we strive to maximize the achievement of our 2026 targets and prepare more effectively for the subsequent phase.

Alongside these achievements, we must frankly acknowledge existing limitations and difficulties, which can be synthesized into six major challenges:

First, economic growth reached approximately 8.2 percent, falling short of the set target of 9.7 percent. A total of 25 out of 34 localities reported GDP growth at a slower pace than their six-month targets, with both Ha Noi and Ho Chi Minh City failing to meet requirements. To achieve this year's double-digit growth target, the economy must grow by 11.9 percent in the second half, which presents a monumental challenge.

The disbursement of public investment capital, the execution of strategic infrastructure projects, national target programs, and key national works remained slower than required. Seven ministries and central agencies recorded disbursement rates below 5 percent. Disbursement for science, technology, innovation, and digital transformation only reached about 10 percent of the allocated capital.

I request the Government to conduct a meticulous review and resolutely reallocate capital where necessary. Furthermore, the year-end report needs to evaluate more clearly the quality of growth, the actual income of workers and various population groups, and employment. I also request central and local statistical agencies to continue capacity-building, while supplementing and refining the system of new indicators. Statistical data must be comprehensive, objective, accurate, and reflective of reality to better serve analysis, forecasting, and policymaking.

Second, growth has not permeated evenly across sectors. Labor-intensive manufacturing and processing industries—such as textiles, footwear, woodwork, and food processing—still face hardships. Major service sectors, including retail, transportation, accommodation, and finance-banking, all performed below the projected scenarios. This indicates that the sectors generating the most employment and actual income for the population have not seen proportional improvements.

Third, while exports grew significantly, imports increased at a faster pace. The domestic sector only increased exports by about 2.5 percent, whereas the FDI sector surged by nearly 25 percent. The occurrence of a trade deficit for seven consecutive months (amounting to approximately US$17 billion) is a phenomenon that warrants close attention. The FDI sector recorded a trade surplus, yet the domestic sector ran a deficit. Consequently, the economy remains dependent on external supply chains and exposed to risks regarding product origin, trade fraud, and trade remedies in key export markets.

(Thus far, we have only addressed the trade balance of goods, without paying sufficient attention to the persistent deficit in the services balance over the past years. For instance, the services deficit exceeded US$12.3 billion in 2024, approached US$10.23 billion in 2025, and reached US$5.54 billion in the first six months of 2026—with international transport suffering the largest deficit at over US$5.15 billion. In the first half of the year, inbound tourism revenue reached over US$9 billion, but Vietnamese citizens traveling abroad spent an equally generous amount—exceeding US$8.05 billion. Consequently, tourism only recorded a modest surplus of US$950 million compared to a US$480 million surplus in 2025 and a US$380 million deficit in 2024, following deficits in many preceding years). Therefore, I request further analysis of the services balance to formulate a rebalancing strategy for the coming years. To secure a higher tourism surplus, we must upgrade this industry to encourage foreign visitors to spend more, while encouraging Vietnamese citizens to choose domestic travel.

Fourth, sluggish domestic demand. After adjusting for price factors, total retail sales in the first six months rose by only 8.2 percent, falling short of expectations. This indicates that incomes and consumer confidence among a segment of the population have not yet rebounded. Total social investment in the first half of the year reached only 35 percent of the capital requirements needed to achieve double-digit growth (which requires approximately VND5.1 quadrillion).

Fifth, although the investment and business environment has improved, it has yet to meet development demands, as procedural time and costs remain high. Delays persist in issuing guiding documents for Laws and Resolutions passed by the National Assembly. Investment has not proportionately translated into new productive capacity, and public investment disbursement has failed to meet expectations. Many projects remain entangled in planning, land, site clearance, materials, and procedures. Out of over 4,400 projects reviewed, only about one-third have been conclusively resolved. Concurrently, the macroeconomic room is narrowing; if not managed stringently, pressures on inflation, exchange rates, interest rates, and liquidity could emerge simultaneously.

Sixth, the operation of the two-tier local government system remains hesitant in certain localities. A segment of the population continues to face livelihood difficulties. The first phase of constructing 100 inter-level boarding schools in border communes (initiated in 2025) is falling behind schedule. High-quality human resource training in science, technology, and innovation exhibits various deficiencies. Teacher shortages remain prevalent across almost all localities; as of June 2026, the country faced a shortage of over 104.5 thousand teachers across all levels. Urban pollution, lack of housing for workers, natural disasters, droughts, saltwater intrusion, flooding, and water scarcity continue to pose direct challenges to social stability and sustainable development.

Comrades,

These limitations dictate that in the final six months of the year, we must focus heavily on dismantling bottlenecks. I fundamentally agree with the orientations and key tasks for the second half of the year outlined in the Government's report. I request the Government to organize a special action program for the remaining six months, grounded in the spirit of clear tasks, clear personnel, clear accountability, clear deadlines, clear outcomes, and clear inspection mechanisms. I emphasize eight core task groups:

First, we must immediately remove bottlenecks to propel growth to at least 10 percent while firmly maintaining macroeconomic stability. We must urgently resolve delayed projects, stalled works, vacant land, and stagnant resources caused by procedures, planning, site clearance, materials, or the evasion of responsibility. We need to unleash traditional growth drivers and create breakthroughs in new ones.

Fiscal, monetary, and pricing policies must be managed in tandem, directing credit toward production, exports, high-tech industries, supporting industries, innovation, housing, and essential infrastructure. Simultaneously, we must curb speculation and non-performing loans (NPLs) to ensure healthy banking operations and control systemic risks. Budget management must be stringent—combating revenue loss and excessive taxation while nurturing revenue sources from small individual business households. We must counter transfer pricing and waste, prioritizing resources for development investment, science and technology, education, healthcare, and strategic infrastructure.

Tax and fee instruments should be utilized selectively to incentivize green production, green consumption, and technological innovation, and to deter speculation without imposing unjustified burdens on businesses and citizens. Inflation, prices, exchange rates, liquidity, energy prices, and capital flows must be closely monitored. Adjustments to the prices of essential goods and services must follow a well-defined roadmap, while strictly penalizing speculation, hoarding, and price manipulation.

Alongside these measures, we must open up and effectively capitalize on new development spaces: high-rise urban spaces in appropriate areas, underground spaces, low-altitude spaces, digital spaces, and marine spaces. In particular, we must develop the marine economy in depth, sustainably exploiting new marine economic sectors such as offshore wind energy, high-tech marine aquaculture, marine biotechnology, desalination, blue carbon credits, and marine ecosystem restoration. This represents a new growth engine that will expand our development space and enhance the autonomy of the economy.

Second, public investment must serve as priming capital to open new development spaces, focusing on strategic infrastructure and high-spillover works, such as transportation, seaports, high-speed railways, urban railways, digital infrastructure, databases, and projects serving the APEC 2027 Summit.

We must unlock capital flows and improve the investment environment for enterprises, particularly small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and those with orders but lacking capital. Support must be provided for market access, digital transformation, compliance with green standards, and integration into supply chains. Large enterprises, state-owned enterprises, and FDI enterprises must bear the responsibility of developing domestic suppliers.

Third, protect export markets and enhance domestic industrial capacity. Meeting standards regarding origin, intellectual property, the environment, and labor must be treated as a matter of economic security. We must establish early-warning mechanisms and support enterprises in handling trade remedies, ensuring product traceability, meeting green standards, and preventing origin fraud. Concurrently, we must diversify markets, supply sources, transport routes, and investment partners, while transforming the domestic market of 100 million people into a vital engine.

Focus must be placed on developing supporting industries, mechanical manufacturing, electronics, new materials, digital technology, data, AI, and energy technologies. Localization efforts must target design capacity, manufacturing, testing, and mastering technology. FDI must be attracted selectively, prioritizing projects that bring advanced technology, foster linkages with Vietnamese enterprises, train human resources, and transfer technology.

Forth, we must guarantee energy, food, water, data security, and digital sovereignty. Under no circumstances must we allow shortages of electricity, petroleum, essential raw materials, or water for production and daily life. We must accelerate power source and grid projects, energy storage facilities, gas-fired power, and appropriate renewable energy, while promoting thrifty and efficient energy use.

We must proactively invest in, prevent, and adapt to droughts, saltwater intrusion, flooding, storms, landslides, and water scarcity—particularly in the Mekong Delta, the Central Region, the Central Highlands, the Northern Mountainous Region, coastal areas, and major urban centers. Beyond traditional security regarding energy, food, and water, we must regard data, cybersecurity, and digital sovereignty as the nation's new security infrastructure. We must build a clean, interconnected, and secure national data infrastructure to effectively serve governance, economic development, and public service provision

Fifth, continue to refine institutional frameworks, improve the business environment, and ensure the seamless operation of the two-tier local government system. It is imperative to urgently conduct a comprehensive review of the legal system to address overlapping regulations, particularly regarding land, planning, investment, construction, bidding, environment, public assets, and decentralization. Immediate action must be taken to rectify delays in issuing 34 guiding documents guiding the implementation of Laws and Resolutions, preventing any legal vacuums. Furthermore, we must continue to streamline administrative procedures and business conditions, thereby reducing compliance costs. Decentralization and the delegation of authority must be reviewed to ensure they are commensurate with available resources, implementation capabilities, and clear accountability. The framework for official performance evaluation must also be continuously improved.

Sixth, promote socio-cultural and human development, ensuring that all citizens share in the fruits of development. Economic growth is only meaningful when accompanied by improvements in employment, income, housing, education, healthcare, and living environments. Continued efforts must be made to search for, gather, and identify the remains of martyrs. We need to step up retraining, upskilling, and career transition support. Social housing, rental housing, and worker dormitories must be developed in industrial zones and major urban centers. Regarding rental housing, while this is a general policy, sectors and localities must thoroughly assess actual demand, market absorption capacity, and investment efficiency during implementation to ensure a supply-demand balance under appropriate state regulation. Implementation must avoid superficial trends and a focus on mere achievements.

We must effectively implement the policy of providing free annual health check-ups at least once a year and establishing electronic health records. Investments in healthcare and education must be viewed as investments in the country's long-term developmental capacity.

Regarding preparation for the 2026-2027 academic year, (i) expeditiously finalize the criteria and standards for national standard school recognition, and pilot new governance models. Localities must guarantee an adequate supply of schools, classrooms, teachers, textbooks, essential equipment, and school structural safety. They must fully recruit assigned personnel quotas, review and redeploy teachers down to individual communes and wards, reduce unnecessary educational administrative staff, and increase frontline teaching staff; (ii) ensure a safe educational environment, actively preventing violence, abuse, drugs, electronic cigarettes, and cyber risks; (iii) synchronously plan and construct schools and social infrastructure in alignment with population size and local characteristics. Obstacles regarding land funds and investment procedures for school construction must be dismantled; we must not allow urban development to outpace school availability. Boarding schools in border communes must be completed on schedule, ensuring synchronization in terms of teachers, dormitories, clean water, kitchens, equipment, and efficient operation; (iv) urgently provide guidelines for repurposing surplus public residential buildings and state agency headquarters into educational and medical facilities. The opening ceremonies for the 2026-2027 academic year and the inauguration of inter-level boarding schools in mainland border communes must be organized on the morning of September 5, 2026, ensuring solemnity, joy, safety, thrift, and practicality.

Seventh, continue to consolidate national defense and security capabilities, maintain political security, social order, and safety, and proactively prevent and handle risks early and from afar to avoid being passive or caught by surprise, thereby ensuring a peaceful and stable environment for national development.

We must build a strong all-people national defense and solid military zone and regional defense postures. It is crucial to develop an autonomous, dual-use, and modern defense and security industry, enhancing the synergy of the armed forces.

Economic and technological diplomacy must be intensified, closely integrating national defense and security with economic development. Thorough preparations must be made to successfully host the APEC 2027 Summit. Signed international commitments and agreements must be strictly and effectively implemented, transforming them into resources for national development, thereby elevating Viet Nam's international status and prestige. (Progress must be closely monitored, periodic evaluations conducted, and the responsibilities of intergovernmental committees and heads of agencies upheld).

Eighth, continue to build truly clean and strong Party organizations, Party committees, and state administrative systems; resolutely combat corruption, waste, and negative phenomena; and cultivate a contingent of cadres, civil servants, and Party members—particularly leaders—who possess outstanding capacity and are equal to their tasks. Concurrently, we must continue to streamline internal apparatuses, review and rearrange structures to avoid overlapping functions and mandates, and rectify fragmentation in state management as well as delays and bottlenecks in decentralization and delegation. Discrepancies in the operation of the two-tier local government must be promptly rectified.

The 2027 plan must be formulated right from the third quarter of 2026, within the vision of the entire 2026-2030 period. The plan should not merely assign targets but must be based on a correct assessment of bottlenecks and include specific operational scenarios. Policy priorities, tasks, and resources must be identified early. The heads of agencies shall be held accountable for the quality of plan formulation.

I request the Government to urgently materialize the aforementioned tasks into action programs with monthly and quarterly schedules, clearly defining the leading agencies and accountable individuals, and publicly disclosing the implementation results. Heads of agencies must directly steer major, complex, inter-sectoral matters, and protracted bottlenecks. We must terminate the practice of merely reporting difficulties without proposing solutions; matters within the jurisdiction of any tier must be resolved by that tier, and those exceeding authority must be reported promptly with specific proposals.

Growth is a collective responsibility, yet it must be tied to the individual accountability of each minister, head of sector, Party secretary, and local chairperson. Simultaneously, we must encourage officials who dare to act for the common good, coupled with tightening discipline and preventing corruption, waste, group interests, and the evasion or shifting of responsibility.

Dear Comrades,

The country stands before immense development opportunities, but these opportunities can only become reality if we possess high determination, correct thinking, open institutions, an efficiently operating apparatus, officials who dare to act, stronger enterprises, and unified citizens. The general spirit is to exert higher determination, take stronger actions, and implement tasks with greater resolve. We must strive to achieve the highest results for the 2026 targets while laying a solid foundation for 2027 and the country's new development phase.

I firmly believe that with our tradition of solidarity, self-reliance, self-resilience, and the active involvement of the entire political system, the business community, and people nationwide, we will overcome all difficulties, seize opportunities, and successfully fulfill the set tasks, leading the country toward rapid, sustainable, prosperous, democratic, equitable, and civilized development./.

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