Hanoi (VNA) - Vietnamhas made strides in improving its productivity and narrowing the gap withdeveloped and developing countries, according to experts speaking at aconference on increasing productivity and product quality in the industrialsector, held in Hanoi last week.

The country’s productivity has tripled - from 2,800 USD per capita a year in1990 to more than 8,000 USD in 2015.

This was true particularly after the first phase of the project to improveproductivity in the 2011-15 period, in which nearly 65 per cent of Vietnamesestandards met international qualifications. Further, several thousandbusinesses were given support in applying ISO management systems, while 53localities built projects to improve productivity and quality.

However, productivity in Vietnam has seen a large gap with other countries.According to statistics in 2013, its productivity was 14.5 times lower thanSingapore, 10.8 times lower than Japan, 7.3 times lower than Malaysia, and 2.9times lower than Thailand. 

Nguyen Phu Cuong, Director of the Science and Technology Department under theMinistry of Industry and Trade, said that the nation’s energy, steel andchemical sectors have the highest productivity, reaching 450 million VND(20,360 USD) to 1 billion VND per person per year. Garments, textile andleather shoes continue to have low productivity.

The high productivity of sectors mostly depended on available natural resourcesand increasing investment. Increasing productivity based on the application ofhi-tech, science and modern management has been limited, Cuong said.

In addition, the country’s productivity has been low, in comparison with world averagelevels, as up to 96 percent of its businesses are small-and-medium sizedenterprises, with 80 percent of them having low and medium technology levels.

The ministry has been implementing programmes to improve productivity andquality of industrial goods, he added.

From 2012-16, it launched several pilot models applying modern qualitymanagement systems, to improve the ability of local products to integrateinto global supply chains.

Nguyen Anh Tuan, Director of the Vietnam Institute for Productivity, said threefactors contributed to increasing added value, including capital, labour andtotal factors productivity (TFP).

Vietnam has been attractive to foreign investors due to its political andsocial stability, thus creating opportunities for local businesses to accesscapital, equipment, production technology and modern management experiences.The Government should create an environment for businesses to develop theirscale, science, technology, and human resources, while applying internationalmanagement standards, he said.

In the future, the country shouldfocus on key economic sectors and promoting programmes to apply newtechnologies to enhance its productivity.

In addition, policies would alsofocus on promoting small firms with the potential for higher growth byproviding them preferential loans. Knowledge and information would also beprovided to help domestic companies have long-term development orientations.-VNA