Vietnam’s growth quickens to 6.17% in second quarter

The Vietnamese economy has accelerated in the second quarter of 2017, expanding by 6.17% compared with 5.15% in the previous quarter, the General Statistics Office (GSO) has announced.

Overall Vietnam’s GDP in the first half of the year grew by 5.73%, of which the agriculture, forestry and fishery sector rose 2.65%, industry and construction 5.81% and services 6.8%.

A further breakdown shows mining output shrank by 8.2%, the largest reduction since 2011, while the manufacturing sector maintained solid growth at 10.52%.

Growth in the services sector, the largest component of Vietnam’s GDP at 41.84%, was mainly driven by retail and wholesale trade, which increased 7.1% over the same period of last year, according to the GSO.

Industry and construction accounted for 32.76% of GDP, agriculture 15.06%, and product tax minus subsidies 10.34%.

In June, the consumer price index (CPI) fell 0.17% against the previous month, as a result of drops in transport costs (down 0.71%), post and telecommunications (down 0.01%) and catering services (down 0.59%).

Among the goods and services that saw their prices go up in June, utility services and building materials as a single group saw the largest gain at 0.53% while increases in other groups were minimal.

According to the GSO, the price index in June 2017 rose by 0.25% over the previous month and 4.39% from a year ago while the US dollar price index decreased by a slight 0.07% from May and rose 1.5% against June 2016.

Source NDO