Vietnam’s Roaring Economy Is Set for World Stage

New York Times ^ | October 25, 2006 | KEITH BRADSHER

[John Carey]

President’s Planned Trip To Vietnam: Encourage the Economic Miracle Along With Human Rights Improvements

By John E. Carey
For The Washington Times
Planned Publication 26-30 October

President George Bush plans to attend the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) conference November 17-19 in Vietnam. We applaud this effort by the president to make this historic trip to help foster what we call the “Vietnam Economic Miracle.”

Vietnam’s entry to the World Trade Organization (WTO) and the granting of Permanent Normal Trade Relations (PNTR) by the U.S. are virtually assured in the next month or two, or, for PNTR, sometime next year.(1) We support the president and congratulate Vietnam on these successes in bringing the government of Vietnam into the greater world of economic cooperation and prosperity.

But we also urge the President of the United States and the American people to remain mindful of the human rights abuses in Communist Vietnam – abuses which have lessened somewhat in recent years but still paint a troubling picture.

The economy in Vietnam is starting to rumble and many want to participate in the anticipated new prosperity and wealth.

Tourism is exploding in Vietnam along with the associated hotels, restaurants, and other businesses. Tourist arrivals to Vietnam have grown on average 20% per year over the past 15 years, shooting up from 250,000 in 1990 to 3.5 million last year. The first quarter of 2006 saw more than a million tourists visit Vietnam, on pace to hit the government's target of hosting 4 million tourists this year. Some industry analysts optimistically estimate tourist arrivals will double to 8 million in Vietnam by 2010. The industry’s positive cash flow to Vietnam is estimated at two trillion dollars a year.(2)

But there are many other industries and ventures that are currently thriving in Vietnam.

Vietnam’s textile industry is such a potent force that it threatens to destroy what is still remaining of clothing manufacturing in the United States. So the Bush administration promised Senator Elizabeth Dole of North Carolina and Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina in October that it would closely monitor textile and clothing imports from Vietnam after that country joins the World Trade Organization and the United States is required to drop import quotas.

This small promise by the president set off a fire storm among retailers anxious to sell inexpensive clothing from Vietnam without any restrictions.

There are at least 600 software companies in Vietnam. Computer chip manufacturing is huge and growing. Both Japan and China have recently announced huge investments in Vietnam’s computer industry.

Vietnam expects to be responsible for 10 per cent of Japan's $3 Billion offshore software industry by 2010.

Bill Gates visited Vietnam earlier this year because he doesn’t want Microsoft to be left out of the “Vietnam Economic Miracle” many interested in the future of Vietnam have predicted.

Some other aspects of “Vietnam’s Economic Miracle” which have been trumpeted recently by the Communist government controlled media in Vietnam include:

-- Vietnam's three major telecom companies are expected to be partly privatized next year with the majority of the stakes remaining under government control, officials said.

--Authorities in Vietnam have fined an affiliate of South Korea's Daewoo Corp. for using pirated software, the first time a corporate user of illegal software has been targeted in the Southeast Asian country, officials said on October 11.

--Intel has a new $300 Million microchip assembly and test facility in Ho Chi Minh City. It will open later this year, with as much additional investment money expected in the next two years. Canon has three printer factories near Hanoi, Canon's largest manufacturing facility in the world.
--Vietnam, Laos and China signed a border treaty last month; a breakthrough that will hopefully increase commerce and trade.
--Vietnam announced last month that it is firmly committed to "the promotion of gender equality and the advancement of women" and takes the enhancement of women's roles and status a top priority in the national socio-economic development programs. This was a new and breathtaking announcement: just one month ago.
--Under a draft decree, Vietnam will permit transgender people to undergo gender reassignment surgery starting next January, according to local newspaper Saigon Liberation. This shows how eager Vietnam is to display openness and a liberalism in attitude.
In early September Vietnam released prominent dissident and pro-democracy activist Pham Hong Son. Son was originally sentenced to five years in prison. His crime? He translated articles from the U.S. State Department web site for an online journal in Vietnam. The articles were titled “What is democracy?”

Mr. Cong Do, an American citizen, was also falsely imprisoned by earlier this year Vietnam. He has now been released and is advocating the return from Vietnam of another U.S. Citizen: Thuong Nguyen "Cuc" Foshee. (3)

Mrs. Foshee, a U.S. citizen, was taken into custody Sept. 8, 2005. She was not charged, not allowed to post bail, denied an attorney and put in a prison in Ho Chi Minh City. Her crime? While in the U.S. she did business with an organization the government of Vietnam terms “seditionist.” (4)

The Vietnamese people have no free elections. In Vietnam, the Communists Party chooses all candidates prior to an election and no people excluded by the Communists system can run in an election. Since all candidates are nominated by the Party, there is no legitimate “voice of the people.”

The Communist government of Vietnam, like that of China and North Korea, controls and monitors all media including the internet and email. Along with the U.S. Department of State web site, the web site of The Washington Times is not available to readers in Vietnam. The Washington Times is also too “seditionist.”

Although Vietnam currently has more than 600 newspapers; all are owned and controlled by the Party. No private newspaper has ever been allowed to be published. Song lyrics are monitored and have to be approved by the government in Vietnam.

Vietnam has one of the strictest systems of control over public use of the Internet in the world. Many web sites with information on freedom and democracy are not available in Vietnam.

The Vietnamese people do not have freedom of religion and worship. In its annual report on religious freedom, the U.S. State Department listed Vietnam among its top eight “Countries of Particular Concern.”

So we applaud and thank the President of the United States on his planned trip to Vietnam. And we want the U.S. economy to share in all the benefits of Vietnam’s anticipated growth.

And Mister President: Please bring home Mrs. Foshee. (5)

And let’s all remain mindful of our American commitment to human rights and our American values in the process of expanding the “Vietnam Economic Miracle.”

[John Carey]

Here is the economic scene in Vietnam:

For the last 20 years, the Communist government in Hanoi, Vietnam has followed a policy called "Doi Moi" (The Industrial Development Policy in the Renovation). This policy brought about increasing productivity and revenue for people and the government of Vietnam. However, there is a sad aspect for the workers: their minimum wage has been going down and the value of the currency in Vietnam, the dong, has been dropping.

The average per year per capita income in Vietnam is about $880. The Vietnamese government aims to increase per capita income to $1,100-$1,200 by 2010.

Indeed, to attract foreign investments, the government has lowered the workers' minimum wage from 45-50 US dollars per month in 1999 to 35-40 US dollars in 2005.

Moreover, Vietnamese workers have been often exploited by their employers and the foreign companies they serve. The Workers Union of Vietnam, an organization created by the government, and whose staffs receive their salaries from the government or from foreign corporations, has been indifferent to the miseries of the workers and powerless in defending their legitimate rights and interests.

This caused hundreds of strikes by hundreds of thousands of workers.

Because the Vietnamese workers are exploited and repressed by their employers and abandoned by the government and the Workers Union, on October 20, 2006, the Independent Worker Union of Vietnam came into being to support and defend workers' legitimate rights.

We, the undesigned, are people from all over the world who solemnly declare:

Firstly, we welcome and actively support The Independent Worker Union of Vietnam in its struggle to defend the basic and legitimate rights of the Vietnamese workers in Vietnam and all over the world;

Secondly, we call on all Vietnamese organizations, all workers unions of the free and democratic nations in the world to raise their voices to accept The Independent Worker Union of Vietnam and actively support the Independent Worker Union of Vietnam in its mission to protect the Vietnamese workers' rights.

[staytrue]

You don't get something for nothing.

The vietnamese want and need western capital and know how.

They will not get it for nothing.

The only thing they have to trade is cheap labor.

[Stallone]

John Kerry is NOT pleased.

[John Carey]

I do not understand your comment.

[John Carey]

Freedom of Speech?

Thu Oct 12, 6:38 AM ET

HANOI (AFP) - Vietnam's Ministry of Culture and Information has asked all provinces to pay strict attention to vocabulary used in songs and to exclude slang and inappropriate wording, an official has said.

The ministry send on October 6 a circular to all offices in the country to make sure young composers create better-worded songs, said Pham Dinh Thanh, director of the ministry's art performance department.

"We have asked local officials to pay greater attention to the contents of songs before they are publicly used," he told AFP.

"The censorship concerns exclusively the vocabulary," he said, adding there was "nothing political" in the move.

State-controlled website VietnamNet said "the public has raised its voice about the trend of using 'garbage' words in Vietnamese songs."

"Online forums to attack the creation of what could be translated as 'shockingly-worded songs' have stirred up a large discussion among the public on the issue."

The ministry asked that "badly-worded" songs be changed before licences are issued.

A group of inspectors in different provinces will decide whether or not songs need rewording. Based on the decisions made by these judges, licences will or will not be issued.

[The Duke]

UNCOMFORTABLE QUESTION: If communists are such worthy trading partners, why did we sacrifice so many of our young men fighting the spread of communism in decades past? What do we say to their ghosts?

[johnthebaptistmoore]

John Kerry served in Vietnam!

[Freee-dame]

bump

[hnj_00]

most communists ...china and vietnam seem to have embraced capitalism....somehow not quite what marx & engels envisioned!!!

[durasell]

No, they use it as a tool. They have far from embraced either capitalism or the freedoms we generally associate with it.

[dogbyte12]

It's all about the authoritarianism with China and Vietnam. Economics was just a fig leaf. They are trying to be like Singapore, not like Japan. If people are free to use capital, but not free to criticize the dear leaders in charge, the Chinese and the Vietnamese are cool with that.

[Blueflag]

You nailed it.

Communism sells well, but is actually totalitarian socialism with a capitalist veneer to parts of the economy -- the trading interface.

True communism is always ineffective and non-competitive when practiced. Socialism is a failed model, and the communists have long practiced authoritarianism and called it 'communism.'

[tcostell]

While I agree in principle, I think it's important to remember that calling it communism is only a fairly recent development. In terms of the people and their relationship with their rulers, China has had basically the same kind of ruling authority for several thousand years, no matter what it's called.

What we call "corruption" is what the Chinese call "the fabric of society". It's inconceivable to them that a country of their size be ruled without some sort of family based system of favors and exemptions.

Before it was called communism, it was called nationalism, and before that it was called imperial china... but the society hasn't changed too terribly much... just the people handing out the favors.

The throne is the same even if someone else is sitting in it. Even if they stop calling it a throne and start calling it "The peoples chair."

[newcthem]

Personally I don't give a rats@ss how booming their economy is, I wouldn't buy a frickin' thing from there.........I can still remember the friends who were lost over there.

[ThanhPhero]

The Communists here become worthy trading partners as they jettison the effects of classical Communism.We were not fighting against the Vietnamese people. The actual enemy in that war was the Soviet Empire. It was a classic border war of empire. The Communist government in Viet Nam is not an enemy or a force we must staunchly oppose. Without the Soviet Empire the Vietnamese government is merely a minor despotism the likes of which we get along with all around the world. It is in our interest for Viet Nam to develop a modern economy and a democratic system. Viet Nam is pretty much an ally against our only potential Communist enemy, China. America is having a great effect on the system in Viet Nam. Beyond the initial Doi Moi reforms almost all of the improvements have been responses to American pressure and due to government desire to please the Americans. Bitterness at the outcome of the war should be directed at our own establishment in its conduct of that war with its emphases on hearts-and-minds and on not actually defeating the invading forces. The Vietnamese people, almost all of them, are America's biggest fans in all the world. Viet Nam now is very like South Korea was under Syngman Rhee and Park Chung Hee and is set to develop the same way. Regardless of official pronouncements and occasional spasms of despotic reaction, there is an ever increasing effective level of freedom in the country. Private property in land is probably at least as secure, now, in Viet Nam as it is in the US, especially after the Kelo Decision which pretty much eliminated it as being Constitutionally protected here.

[ThanhPhero]

They have a lot more than cheap labor. They have brains and drive and a love and talent for business.

[ThanhPhero]

Viet Nam has embraced freemarket economics because the rulers saw that it was necessary for Viet Nam to develop a strong economy in order to avoid being a neutered dog on a Chinese leash and they learned from their early efforts in 1975-84 or so that socialism doesn't actually work. The limiting factor inpermitting freemarket reforms is the desire of certain men to retain their status and position-keep their jobs. I hate the facile use of the word capitalism when free market is the term desired. Socialism is capitalism. So is Communism and also Mercantilism. Capitalism is any system that advances by amassing and allocating saved value i.e. capital. The free market is far and away the most efficient way to do that. Communism is arguably the least efficient and can work as well as it does only if there is a functioning free market system whose effects it can try to copy.

[durasell]

Thanks for the thoughtful response...

However, isn't the Vietnamese gov't -- like the Chinese -- still putting many restraints on the market, i.e. controlling wages, what kind of businesses can open, etc.