Trucks deliver containers to Dinh Vu port in Hai Phong city, Vietnam, March 31, 2022. (VNA/Handout via Xinhua)

Vietnam’s GDP grew 5.03% in the first quarter of this year, compared to 4.72% in the same period last year and 3.66% in the first quarter of 2020, creating a springboard for economic growth during the next quarters of 2022.

HANOI, April 10 (Xinhua) — Vietnam’s production and business recovered in the first quarter of this year, but still face many obstacles, including the adverse effects of the global pandemic and the Russian-Ukrainian conflict in course, said local experts and international organizations. .

According to Vietnam’s General Statistics Office (GSO), which falls under the Ministry of Planning and Investment, the country’s gross domestic product (GDP) grew by 5.03% in the first quarter of this year, compared to 4 .72% in the same period last year, and 3.66% in the first quarter of 2020, creating a springboard for economic growth in the coming quarters of 2022.

“Vietnam’s economy has gradually recovered with an acceleration in production and business activities in the first quarter of this year. The country will show higher GDP growth in the second quarter due to its full reopening and better containment of COVID-19,” said local economist Dinh Trong. Thinh, a veteran lecturer at the Finance Ministry’s Academy of Finance, told Xinhua on Friday.

According to him, the highlight of Vietnam’s economic growth in the first quarter of 2022, when the global supply chain began to pick up and regain momentum, was the remarkable acceleration of a “three-horsepower car “, namely investment, export and consumption.

People shop at a supermarket in Hanoi, Vietnam on January 7, 2022. (VNA/Handout via Xinhua)

Between January and March, realized social investment capital at current prices amounted to 562.2 trillion Vietnamese dong (24.4 billion U.S. dollars), showing an increase of 8.9 percent year-on-year.

During the three-month period, realized foreign direct investment capital rose 7.8% year-on-year to more than $4.4 billion, the highest amount in the first quarter in five last years. Meanwhile, Vietnam welcomed nearly 91,000 foreign visitors, up 89.1 percent from the same period last year, after the tourism market reopened, resuming many international air routes.

In terms of exports, the country earned nearly $88.6 billion from the shipment of goods, including 15 items with an export turnover of over $1 billion, to abroad in the first quarter of this year, up 12.9% year on year. It achieved a trade surplus of US$809 million.

Workers make shoes for export at a shoe company workshop in Hanoi, Vietnam, April 1, 2022. (VNA/Handout via Xinhua)

Meanwhile, total retail sales of consumer goods and services amounted to 1.318 trillion Vietnamese dong, up 4.4 percent year on year.

“In addition to the three bright spots of investment, export and consumption, many service sectors including finance, banking and insurance, transportation and warehousing, and wholesale and retail, made a greater contribution to Vietnam’s economic growth in the first quarter of this year,” Mince said.

However, the economist expressed concern about a potentially high inflation rate. “I fear that the consumer price index (CPI) this year will double from last year,” he said, noting that the CPI rose 1.84% in 2021 and by 1.92% in the first quarter of 2022, when many countries around the world are facing the largest price increase in several decades.

The economic growth of some of Vietnam’s major partners, such as the United States and the European Union, is expected to decline. Vietnam will find the GDP growth target of 6 to 6.5 percent set for this year by its top legislature difficult, OSG Director General Nguyen Thi Huong told reporters in late March.

Women wearing traditional Vietnamese ao dai dress greet tourists in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, April 8, 2022. (VNA/Handout via Xinhua)

To achieve the goal of economic growth, Vietnam will focus on taking seven groups of measures, including effectively combating the COVID-19 pandemic while helping businesses recover and grow in 2022. -2023; control the prices of essential goods and services and ensure their supply; stimulate national production, including electricity production; promote the local market as well as export in a sustainable way; rapid recovery of the tourism market; accelerate administrative reform; and actively deal with natural disasters, she said.

On April 5, the World Bank lowered its GDP growth forecast for Vietnam this year to 5.3%, down from the 6.5% projection it made last October.

Over 78% of Vietnam’s population is fully immunized, but the economy still faces serious downside risks from possible new variants, global ripple effects from the Russian-Ukrainian conflict, rising prices raw materials and the economic slowdown in its main export markets, the bank said. .

“Economic recovery will also depend on the recovery of domestic private demand, which has been slow, highlighting consumer and investor uncertainty. The current spike in infections could lead to temporary labor supply and production disruptions,” the World Bank said.

On April 6, the Asian Development Bank predicted that Vietnam’s economy will grow 6.5 percent this year while developing economies in Asia are expected to grow 5.2 percent amid global uncertainty. (1 US dollar equals 22,862 Vietnamese dong)■