Viet Nam’s economy could achieve a growth rate of 7 per cent in 2018, despite an anticipated decline in the mining industry.

This was revealed in a recent report of the Sai Gon Securities Joint Stock Company (SSI).

The economy would be boosted by policies focusing on promoting the private economic sector and developing new drivers such as tourism, hi-tech agriculture and the model of special administrative economic zones, the report said.

SSI said that the Government’s economic growth target of 6.5-6.7 per cent for 2018 was too modest, after the economy grew at a 10-year high of 6.81 per cent in 2017 - exceeding the target of 6.7 per cent.

The report said that the growth of the services sector, which accounted for 41.32 per cent of the country’s gross domestic product (GDP), had a significant impact on the overall growth.

Most of the sub-sectors in the services sector posted high growth rates in 2017, especially accommodation and catering (9 per cent, a four-year high), transportation and warehouse (7.91 per cent, a seven-year high), the wholesale and retail industry (8.36 per cent) and the real estate business (4.07 per cent, an eight-year high).

The industry and construction sectors, accounting for 33.3 per cent of GDP, grew at 8 per cent in 2017.

However, the mining industry posed a record drop of 7.1 per cent due to a 10.8 per cent drop in crude oil exploitation and 0.5 per cent drop in coal exploitation.

Excluding the mining industry, SSI estimated that the Vietnamese economy could have grown at 7.9 per cent in 2017.

Viet Nam’s economic growth significantly depended on foreign investment and the recovery of the global commodities prices, which SSI considered reasonable, while the domestic resources remained limited.

Nguyen Duy Hung, chairman of SSI, in an interview with vneconomy.vn, said that it was critical to improve growth quality, enhance investment efficiency and improve productivity. — VNS