Vietnam’s astounding economic progress is set to continue into the new year despite COVID-19 and the general disruption in international economies and supply chains caused by worldwide lockdown this year. All the while having far fewer deaths than countries such as the UK even with a much larger population and sharing a massive land border with China, the outbreak’s origin.
Figures from the IMF (International Monetary Fund) have shown that Vietnam’s economy is expected to have grown 2.4% this year, which doesn’t sound like a lot until you consider that most of the world’s economies have shrank markedly over the same period. Further improvement is expected next year, with growth of 6.5% expected for 2021 as domestic production and tourism are expected to normalise to bring back Vietnam’s incredibly impressive growth rates.
Vietnam’s “socialist orientated market economy”, which involves heavy levels of public ownership and investment allowed the government to mobilise resources quickly to fight the pandemic by quickly developing testing kits and distributing masks and food en masse to the public.
Despite the hardship Vietnam will need much less of a bounce back from COVID-19 than most first world countries, let alone third world countries that are spiralling into an ever worsening economic nightmare made worse by the pandemic. Vietnam’s socialist planning and government has shown what socialism could have done to potentially save hundreds of thousands of lives and billions of pounds in other countries, they stand as a shining example of what a united working class can achieve.
Daniel Forrest
