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Vietnam’s Jan-Jun GDP hits 8-year high at 7.08%, inflation returns

The Hanoitimes – Growth in industry and construction sector remains major momentum for Vietnam’s gross domestic product (GDP) during the first six months of 2018.
Vietnam posted year-on-year GDP growth of 7.08% in the first two quarters of 2018, the best first-six-month performance in the last eight years, backed by growth in industry and construction, the General Statistics Office (GSO) said on June 29.
Specifically, GDP of first quarter increased by 7.45% while that of second quarter climbed by 6.79%, the office added.
Yet “the GDP growth slowed down and we no longer see the trend that the expansion in the succeeding quarter exeeds that of the previous one”, Nguyen Bich Lam – Head of GSO said.
Industry-construction and service sectors, which posted the year-on-year rise of 9.07% and 6.9%, respectively, remain the GDP’s main drivers of growth.
Within the sector of industry and construction, the latter increased by 9.28%, marking a remarkable rise against the same period of 2016 and 2017 (7.01% and 5.42%, respectively). Among the subsector, notable growth was seen in processing and manufacturing industry that reached 13.02%, the highest since 2011.  
However, the impressing growth in processing and manufacturing industry, according to Lam, can hardly continue during late 2018. Growth in electronic and machine manufacturing would suffer from slower pace while the mining sector eased.
“Samsung will launch new products in the next six months, but their growth can hardly surpass its performance in the same period last year”, the head of the GSO predicted.
Besides, inflation showed sign of returning when the consumer price index (CPI) moved up 3.29% year-on-year.
The statistics officials noted that, to keep the index under 4% on average, the government and ministries need to reconsider the timing of hiking prices of basic goods and services in order to avoid excessive inflation expectations.  
Source: http://www.hanoitimes.vn/economy/industry/2018/06/81E0C929/vietnam-s-jan-jun-gdp-hits-8-year-high-at-7-08-inflation-returns/