Sydney (VNA) – The Vietnamese economy has shownresilience in the face of global headwinds, an Australian economist wrote in arecent article.

The article was posted on the East Asia Forum bySuiwah Dean-Leung – Honorary Associate Professor of Economics at the CrawfordSchool of Public Policy, the Australian National University. 

It says Vietnam’s GDP growth is projected by theWorld Bank to be around 6 percent for 2016 — higher than the large ASEANeconomies of Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand. This growth has beenbolstered mainly by robust domestic demand and strong performance inmanufacturing exports.

Retail sales rose by 9.5 percent during theyear, indicating a healthy degree of consumer confidence supported by hikes inpublic sector wages as well as increases in incomes generally. Meanwhile, thepurchasing managers’ index rose to 54 in November from 51.7 in October — anynumber above 50 signals an expansion in manufacturing output.

Core inflation is low and headline inflation isat 4.9 percent on a year-on-year basis for 2016, mainly due to increases inadministered prices for education and health.

The Vietnamese dong remained reasonably steadyagainst the US dollar for much of the year, and foreign reserves rose steadily,according to the article.

However, cutbacks in oil production, weakexternal demand and falls in agricultural output due to drought have preventedeconomic growth from reaching the government’s earlier target of 6.5 to 6.8percent for 2016.

Dean-Leung wrote that Vietnam’s economic outlookis mixed, as rising global economic uncertainty challenges Hanoi’s commitmentto necessary medium-term structural reforms.

For the time being, Vietnam is maintainingmacroeconomic stability as it will certainly face significant challenges suchas increased uncertainties over international trade and investment, especiallygiven the moribund status of trade agreements like the Trans-PacificPartnership, the professor added.-VNA