Enterprises in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam’s biggest economic hub, are hardest-hit by the global economic crisis. Secretary of the municipal Party’s Committee Le Thanh Hai said “Local authorities always support businesses to overcome the difficulties”.
Currently, businesses in Ho Chi Minh City are facing challenges. What local authorities will do to support them?
We will always stand behind enterprises to help them overcome difficulties. HCM City and the whole country are coping with fall in the economic growth which is resulted from the high inflation rate and limited resources.
Over the past time, the Vietnamese government has carried out lots of measures to control inflation rate. In the first quarter of this year alone, the country has stabilised foreign currency exchange rate and banking and finance system as well as lower credit interest rates, preventing massive unemployment and boosting effectiveness of the government’s stimulus packages.
These achievements are attributed to great efforts by both local authorities and companies. HCM City is trying to prevent economic slowdown, maintain the stable economic growth and ensure social security.
Which lessons enterprises should learn from the difficulties?
I think, it is time for businesses to turn the challenges into opportunities. The economic slump is a chance for us to train and retrain the unemployed as the world economic structure has changed after the crisis. The qualified labour source will help the city to meet the development demand.
It is time for businesses to pay attention to the domestic market after ignoring it for a long time. Are these difficulties opportunities for enterprises to dominate the domestic market or their temporary business strategies?
In reality, Vietnamese companies still ignore the domestic market. Building a new business strategy aims to make high-quality products for the home market first, before bringing them to the global market, not produce cheap-cost goods. Whey South Korean and Japanese people often use domestically-made products, but prices of the products are still high? This is because they have a long-term customer care strategy.
Vietnamese companies’ policies on goods distribution and promotion still lag behind foreign firms operating in the domestic market. Therefore, expanding the domestic market is not only an urgent task for Vietnamese companies but also an important factor to develop a dependent economy.
The local market is a momentum for Vietnamese firms to compete with foreign rivals. Thus, we should consider the local market as foundation and the foreign market as a key factor for Vietnamese companies’ business strategy. The policy “Vietnamese people use Vietnamese goods” is not only valid for three, five but also 100 years and longer. Nevertheless, Vietnam needs to have a roadmap and measures to fight against imitation goods and bad-quality products. The state and enterprises must join hands to do this.
HCM City has actively followed Late President Ho Chi Minh’s testament to integrate into the global market. Could you tell more about this?
When he was alive, President Ho Chi Minh wished to make Vietnam become more proper. Following the President’s testament, we ask all local party organisations and each cadres and party member to respect public opinion and closely cooperate with enterprise to mobilise all resources for the city’s development.
The city also attaches the economic growth with development of the healthcare and education sectors, environment protection and food safety as well as poverty reduction. Additionally, it strictly fights against corruption and waste, boost administrative reform, improve investment environment and ensure social order to deserve the name the city named after Late President Ho Chi Minh and the city of hero.
L.B.N
Vietnamese
