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Content
The Development of East and Southeast Asia and Implications for Vietnam
The Vietnam Leaders in Development Program will start with a module on long-term development strategies. It will examine the growth trajectories followed by East and Southeast Asian countries and identify key features of the region’s most successful industrializers. This exercise will form an analytical framework for setting development priorities and making strategic decisions, which is tailored to the realities of the Vietnamese economy. Based on this framework, the participants will discuss Vietnam’s current growth strategy, considering the degree to which Vietnam’s current policies are aligned with the country’s long-term development goals.
The session will draw upon recent policy analysis of the Harvard Vietnam Program and the Fulbright School, including Choosing Success, an analysis of Vietnam’s long-term development strategy in comparative perspective. Faculty facilitators will update this analysis and lead participants in a discussion.
Economically Rational Infrastructure and Energy Policy in a Rapidly Growing Economy
International experience demonstrates that countries which fail to develop economically rational infrastructure development strategy encounter difficulties in sustaining growth over the long term. Infrastructure policy is also closely linked to urban development. This module will consider Vietnam’s infrastructure needs from an economic perspective, considering investment priorities and financing models. The best ways for government agencies at different levels and sectors to coordinate in the planning, implementation, and management of economically-viable infrastructure projects is the key discussion issue of the module.
Among infrastructure sectors, energy policy plays a central role in advancing Vietnam’s socioeconomic development objectives with the recognition that providing stable, rationally priced electricity is critical to maintaining economic growth. Its exploration of Vietnam’s current energy use and strategy will be informed by international perspectives. By analyzing the most important trends in global energy markets and approaches developing countries have taken to meet their energy needs, the session will identify key considerations that should inform the government’s long-term energy policies.
In the following case study discussion on electricity, the participants will be presented with a snapshot of Vietnam’s generating mix, key features of Vietnam’s electricity strategy over the past decade and its current energy master plan. Using this case study as background information and the analytical framework developed in the previous session, the participants will analyze the challenge of providing reliable electricity in Vietnam at reasonable prices. By comparing different generating technologies and also considering pricing and demand, there will be an opportunity for students to see the problems that EVN is facing and how it might overcome them. There will be a comparison with Thailand’s electricity company, EGAT, a larger and slower growing company that is well managed and highly regarded. Problems of securing reliable energy supplies at a reasonable price and of dealing with wildly fluctuating global energy prices will also be part of the case.
Urban Development: Fueling the Growth Engines of the National Economy
This module will begin with a review of the population growth and concentration of economic activities in and around Vietnam’s major cities. This will form the basis for a followed discussion on urban infrastructure challenges given this growth and changes in national and local priorities that need to be made in order to keep the major growth engines in the economy functioning.
Using Ho Chi Minh City as a case study, specific issues relating to urban land-use planning, housing and transport developments will be discussed. Getting urban growth right is a critical and difficult problem for all fast-growing economies, and the special issues of Ho Chi Minh City require particular attention to the problems it faces: a large under-reported population; a uniquely huge reliance on motor-cycles for transport; extremely high land prices; an inadequate tax base; limited roads relative to traffic; and development projects that could aggravate flooding. Given the weight of Ho Chi Minh City and nearby provinces in the overall economy, a better analysis and response to these problems is needed if Vietnam is to transform itself successfully in the next decade or two.
Current Macroeconomic Issues: Prospects for Sustained Growth
As Vietnam’s economy is facing its most serious challenges since the mid-1980s, the program will use the last session to consider major factors that have contributed to the current macroeconomic instability. Root causes for problems in three macro-monetary areas, namely, price inflation, trade deficits causing depreciating pressure on the exchange rate, and banking illiquidity and insolvency will be discussed. More importantly, they will be linked to the development pattern and structural weaknesses of the domestic economy presented in the previous sessions.
The faculty and participants will go through a list of policy actions that are needed to bring back macro stability. In this exercise, the importance of a comprehensive government-led stabilization program which is both technically sound and politically feasible will be stressed.
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