Vietnam Asia’s great success story

 Fifty years ago the last Americans were evacuated from Saigon, leaving behind a war-ravaged and impoverished country. Today Saigon, renamed Ho Chi Minh City, is a metropolis of over 9m people full of skyscrapers and flashy brands. 

The country has attracted $230bn of multinational investment and become an electronics-assembly titan. Chinese, Japanese, South Korean and Western firms all operate factories there. In the past decade Vietnam has grown at a compound annual rate of 6%, faster than India and China.

Vietnam’s growth miracle is concentrated around a few islands of modernity. 

Big multinational companies run giant factories for export that employ locals. But they mostly buy their inputs abroad and create few spillovers for the rest of the economy. 

This is why Vietnam has failed to increase the share of the value in its exports that is added inside the country. 

If Mr Lam fails, Vietnam will muddle on as a low-value-added production centre that missed its moment. 

But if he succeeds, a second doi moi would propel 100m Vietnamese into the developed world

The Economist 22 May 2025

https://www.economist.com/leaders/2025/05/22/the-man-with-a-plan-for-vietnam

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