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Nguyen Minh Thao, Head of the Business Environment and Competitiveness Research Department at the Central Institute for Economic Management (CIEM) |
In a talk to a reporter from Sai Gon Giai Phong newspaper recently, Nguyen Minh Thao, Head of the Business Environment and Competitiveness Research Department at the Central Institute for Economic Management (CIEM), said this.
According to Ms. Thao, the monitoring of the implementation of Resolution 02/NQ-CP issued on January 10, 2022, with the goal of improving the quality and ranking of the business environment indicators and competitiveness synchronized with the improvement of the national credit rating has shown that most ministries, agencies and localities are aware of the role and significance of business environment reform and competitiveness improvement. Looking back at the goals set for 2022, Ms. Thao admitted some positive achievements have been gained; thereby, the country's confidence has been raised.
She added that in May 2022, the credit rating agency S&P Global Ratings upgraded Vietnam's rating to BB+ which is the highest rating in the BB group in terms of low debt serviceability, heavily impacted by the negative business, economic and financial environment with a stable outlook.
Notably, in the context of the complicated international situation, which led to more than 30 credit downgrades in the world in the first eight months of the year, Vietnam is the only country in the Asia-Pacific region and one of four countries in the world that have been upgraded by Moody's International Credit Rating Agency, she said.
The Head of the Business Environment and Competitiveness Research Department said that over the past 20 years, since the promulgation of the 1999 Enterprise Law, the right to freedom of business has been gradually recognized and expanded. Notably, in the period 2014-2019, business freedom was consolidated and upgraded with the removal of many barriers. However, up to now, the right to freedom of business in our country has not been really protected. State intervention in production and business activities is evident in many fields.
She took examples of state intervention in production and business activities including unresolved barriers to investment procedures lasting many years. Although there have been positive reforms in business conditions in the 2016-2019 period, there are still unnecessary, non-transparent and unreasonable conditions. Procedures for specialized management and inspection are still very heavy, time-consuming and costly. The burden of administrative procedures, inspection and examination is always an obsession plus common informal expenses. Therefore, although the freedom to do business in Vietnam has been upgraded compared to before, on international rankings, this index of the Southeast Asian country still stands at a very low position, even near the bottom of the table.
She suggested that first of all, the Government should direct ministries, sectors and localities to continue effectively implementing solutions to improve the business environment, and especially maintain the stability of business policy.
Moreover, she said that at the same time, the government necessarily sticks to reputable international indicators to identify gaps and problems and create pressure and motivation for improvement. The Government also needs to regularly and periodically re-evaluate the implementation of regulations on conditional business investment lines and business registration and proactively abolish unreasonable and ineffective regulations or those regulations which interfere too deeply in production and business activities.
She added that hopefully, the Prime Minister will continue to issue Resolution 02 in the next year to promote the implementation and further enhance the responsibilities of heads of agencies and units. The annual issuance of a resolution by the Government on improving the business environment is also a reform content recognized by international organizations and included in the evaluation and ranking results of the country.
In her point of view, in 2023, the government should focus on continued reform of business registration and a specialized inspection. Next, the government should focus resources to effectively implement Decision No. 06/QD-TTg on developing the application of population data, especially in building a database to update employees' situation to support when they are at risk when there is a fluctuation in production and business. Last but not least, the government helps to improve the quality of supporting services for business’ sake.
