Photo: CPV Online

Growth theory and economic development were the main topics of a seminar co-hosted by the Ministry for Foreign Affairs and the Party Central Committee’s Theory Council in Hanoi on August 17.

Professor Jomo Kwame Sundaram, United Nations Secretary General Assistant for Economic Development in the UN Department of Social and Economic Affairs, and Professor James Riedel from the US’s Johns Hopkins University, participated in the event.

The seminar also saw the attendance of Vietnam’s Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Pham Gia Khiem, as well as a large number of researchers, advisors and government officials.

Deputy Foreign Minister Doan Xuan Hung, who chaired the seminar, said the adverse impacts of the global economic crisis have shown the Vietnamese economy’s weaknesses and shortcomings, posing various challenges to the country in the next development period.

Vietnam has paid due attention to accumulating opinions and experiences from world-leading economists to address its shortcomings, latch on to opportunities for economic recovery, achieve a high, sustainable growth rate, and realise its target of becoming an industrialised, modernised nation by 2020, Hung said.

The official said the Vietnamese government is stepping up dialogues in order to acquire proposals from scholars both in and outside the country to put together an appropriate development strategy.

In their speeches, both Professor Sundaram and Riedel touched on a number of priorities for and concerns about Vietnam’s socio-economic development, emphasising ways of implementing national strategies without negatively impacting the balance of the financial structure.

Sundaram (popularly known as Professor Jomo) put forth several suggestions related to the globalisation of finance, the liberalisation of domestic finance, the reform of state-owned enterprises and administrative procedures, orientations for export activities and the building of social welfare programmes amid globalisation.

Regarding foreign direct investment (FDI), Professor Jomo said FDI brings considerable benefit to recipient countries in terms of the transfer of technology, knowledge, and skills along with access to markets.

FDI might help Vietnam successfully realise its development targets, but FDI itself will not be the golden key unlocking the door to development, the professor noted.

Professor Jomo, who is known for his study of Southeast Asia’s financial crisis in 1997 and 1998, began his visit on August 13 with a roundtable meeting on the concept of a national development strategy and a discussion of key issues to be addressed in Vietnam’s Socio-Economic Development Strategy for the ten-year period from 2011-2020.

The same day, Professor Riedel participated in a workshop entitled ‘The Global financial crisis and long-term suggestions for Vietnam’s fledgling market economy.’

Organised by the Vietnam Academy of Social Sciences, the workshop brought together a number of lawmakers and experts from research institutes and universities across the country. (VNA)