February sees increasing economic growth

Economic performance was reported to be robust in February, particularly in foreign investment attraction and export .
According to the Ministry of Planning and Investment, the country drew 781mio US$ of registered foreign investment in February, a 1% increase over the same period last year. Foreign invested businesses also disbursed 350mio US$, 34% over the corresponding period last year.
Taking the lead among foreign investors in Viet Nam was Thailand, followed by Japan and Taiwan.
February also witnessed a sharp growth of import-export values with export earnings reaching almost 6.76 billion USD, a 23.5% year-on-year increase; and import value of more than 7.8 billion USD, a 45.8% rise.

Many export staples including coffee, cashew nuts, tea and coal, increased in both volume and value over last year.

However, two members of the club of 1 billion US$ export value last year, namely crude oil and rice, showed a marked decrease compared to the same period last year.
In addition, the great difference between the growth rate of imports and exports showed signs of instability and trade deficit, which requires big efforts to maintain a trade balance in coming months.

In the first two months of this year, the country's industrial production value reached 89,000 billion VND, a 17.5% rise over last year. Industrial production growth in all the state-owned, non-state and foreign-invested sectors rose 8.8%, 19.8% and 22%, respectively.
The lunar new year and other festivals early this year helped the country attract more than 749,000 foreign visitors in the two months, a 11.3% over last year. Most foreign visitors came from Spain, Malaysia and Thailand.

Source: VNA