Socio-economic situation in 11 months of 2025:

Electronic equipment manufacturing at Rhythm Precision Vietnam Co., Ltd., Noi Bai Industrial Park ( Hanoi ). *Photo: Nguyen Quang*

Bright spots...

The economy in November and 11 months of 2025 continued to maintain a positive trend: Inflation was controlled, major balances were ensured, many important indicators improved compared to the previous month and the same period in 2024. According to data released by the General Statistics Office ( Ministry of Finance ) on December 6, the Consumer Price Index (CPI) in November 2025 increased by 0.45% compared to the previous month and increased by 3.28% compared to December 2024. On average, in the first 11 months of 2025, the CPI increased by 3.29% over the same period last year. These developments show that the target of controlling inflation in 2025 is completely feasible.

Industrial production in November continued to maintain a positive growth momentum as businesses boosted production to meet year-end consumption and export demand. The industrial production index in November increased by 2.3% compared to the previous month and by 10.8% over the same period. In the first 11 months, this index increased by 9.3% over the same period last year. The processing and manufacturing industry continued to be a bright spot with an increase of 10.6%, higher than the 9.6% of the same period in 2024. With a large scale, this industry contributed 8.5 percentage points to the overall growth, playing a supporting role for the entire industry.

The accumulated state budget revenue for 11 months reached VND2,397.7 trillion, equal to 121.9% of the year's estimate and up 30.9% over the same period. Total import-export turnover reached 839.75 billion USD, up 17.2%; the trade balance of goods had a surplus of 20.53 billion USD. Total retail sales of goods and consumer service revenue increased by 9.1%, of which accommodation and food revenue increased by 14.6% and tourism increased by 19.9%, reflecting the effectiveness of consumer stimulus and tourism promotion programs. The country had 275.6 thousand newly established and re-operated enterprises, up 26.1% over the same period. FDI attraction reached 33.69 billion USD, up 7.4% over the same period last year...

*Infographic: General Statistics Office*

...and the challenges

Many international organizations have raised their growth forecasts for Vietnam. Notably, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) has just adjusted its 2025 growth forecast for Vietnam from 6.6% to 6.7% thanks to positive prospects from structural reforms and sustainable infrastructure investment. Meanwhile, the Global Economics and Market Research Department of UOB Bank (Singapore) has raised its growth forecast for Vietnam this year, assessing that Vietnam is one of the fastest growing economies in ASEAN. Vietnam's economic growth results in 2025 have so far exceeded expectations, despite risks from US tax policies. With a growth rate of 7.85% in the first three quarters of the year, the outlook for the whole year remains positive. However, the final quarter of the year is expected to face many challenges in the context of trade tensions and tariffs. As a result, UOB maintained its Q4-2025 growth forecast at 7.2%, while revising up its full-year growth forecast to 7.7% from 7.5% previously.

Thus, despite the complicated and unpredictable developments in the world context; increasing strategic competition between major countries; trade tensions, military conflicts and political instability in the world, Vietnam's economy still demonstrates its ability to recover quickly and has a stable foundation. Despite achieving many positive results, the economy still faces many difficulties and challenges. Traditional growth drivers have not met expectations. Public investment capital - an important driving force for growth - is still disbursed slowly. According to the Ministry of Finance, by November 30, 2025, public investment disbursement reached VND 553,250.4 billion, equivalent to 60.6% of the plan assigned by the Prime Minister, 2.4 percentage points higher than the same period in 2024 in terms of ratio and VND 155,729.8 billion in absolute numbers. However, this result is still far from the requirements. To complete the target of disbursing 100% of public investment capital, the pressure is huge as the volume is still large while the remaining time is very limited.

Although consumption has recovered positively, it has not really made a breakthrough, and retail sales of goods are still slow to recover. In particular, the situation of natural disasters has been very complicated recently, with floods at historic levels, causing very serious damage to people and property, affecting economic growth. If natural disasters in 2024 caused damage of about 0.4% of the gross domestic product (GDP), the damage in 2025 is estimated to be much larger. To proactively respond, on November 25, the Government issued Resolution No. 380/NQ-CP on solutions to overcome the consequences of natural disasters, restore production in localities in the Central region, directing ministries, branches and localities to urgently overcome the consequences of natural disasters, quickly stabilize people's lives, restore production, and strive for economic growth of over 8% for the whole year. Meanwhile, new growth drivers need time to take effect.

According to experts, to achieve the economic growth target of over 8% in 2025, in addition to controlling inflation and maintaining macroeconomic stability, it is necessary to focus strongly on accelerating the disbursement of public investment capital; thoroughly cutting cumbersome administrative procedures and effectively attracting FDI capital flows, especially implementation capital. In addition, it is necessary to strongly develop the domestic market, especially e-commerce; at the same time, promote trade promotion activities, promotions, discounts, organize fairs, especially during holidays and Tet to stimulate consumption. At the same time, it is necessary to promote new growth drivers such as science and technology, innovation, digital transformation; green economy, circular economy, creative economy, international financial centers, free trade zones, new business models, etc.

Comment (0)