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Managing growth key to VN's future sustainable development
During her three-day working visit to Viet Nam, Inger Andersen, vice president of Sustainable Development at the World Bank, talks with the Viet Nam News.
What is the purpose of your visit?
We are looking at some of the countries that have significant growth. Viet Nam is one of them, growing with amazing resources: moving millions of people out of poverty, millions of children into school and millions of people on to electricity.
We are working globally, so we want to learn and understand what works as part of the success here.
At the same time, Viet Nam is facing some real tough challenges including climate change. We have been engaged with the Vietnamese on this for a number of years to work out how cities can grow without paying the cost of growth.
We have seen in other countries how pollution can shave points off the GDP. If a country is growing at 7 per cent it can shave off the whole thing. That is a lot. We would want to make sure that this does not happen here.
Could you please give me a concise description of the meetings with the Ministry of Planning and Investment on Monday afternoon?
We actually had a very good meeting with Minister of Planning and Investment Vo Hong Phuc, who was in Washington last month. He emphasised the importance that the Vietnamese Government attached to the World Bank-Viet Nam relationship [over 34 years] and he said the Vietnamese Government looked at continued support from the World Bank.
Clearly infrastructure remains a very important priority, which is an area we have worked on with Viet Nam for nearly two decades, as well as the importance of addressing some of the social sectors, health and education, but also very much the importance of some of the new things that are happening in Viet Nam, particularly climate change.
Right now there is a typhoon off-shore, the sort of the pressures that climate change is putting on the country. In that context, the country is experiencing an intensity of floods and droughts. So we discussed what and how we can prepare and work together and what the World Bank can offer in mitigating those climate shocks, as we see in other places, such as in Pakistan recently.
Climate shocks, particularly rainfall shocks, can seriously hamper and set back the country's development growth, as we have experienced in Pakistan.
For dealing with climate issues we discussed three areas: One deals with institutional aspects, ensuring that various governmental agencies are well-co-ordinated. (The second is related to) policy aspects to ensure that the right things are done. The third concerns infrastructure aspects, such as ensuring the protection of sea dyke or mangroves, etc, are in place.
The minister also highlighted the importance of the five-year plan and the importance that the government attaches to a continuing growth rate of 6-7 or 7-8 per cent.
In the context of that high growth setting, we discussed the significance of trying to avoid the issues that other countries had faced in the growth period where there was a heavy environmental cost.
So we discussed how Viet Nam could avoid having to go through a polluting stage and could leapfrog over this stage and go more "green". We also discussed how we could collaborate on finding a growth path that would enable Viet Nam to take measures now to avoid having to pay for clean-ups later.
We are in the process of preparing a partnership strategy with Viet Nam for the 2011-15 period. Within that partnership strategy, resources will be programmed towards the kinds of priorities that the government has outlined, reflecting priorities in the national socio-economic development plan and strategies.
A Vietnamese official recently said that the country's economic infrastructure was not well developed. What should be done to strengthen it?
The interesting thing is that infrastructure is nearly out-paced by development. So you plan one road and before you know it the road is too narrow: you need four lanes instead of two. You plan one extension of water, you put on new energy capacity and before you know it they are outstripped by demand.
That is one aspect that I think is important. The second aspect we find in many countries is the need to ensure there are sufficient resources for operation and maintenance so infrastructure is adequately maintained. I know that is one of the priorities of the Vietnamese Government: to ensure that they don't fall behind in budgeting for operation and maintenance.
To do so, of course, it is important that there is enough budget resources available, because one can't plan if the budget is too tight.
Economic opportunities in urban areas are speeding up rapid growth in urban populations with significant rural-to-urban migration. What pressures does this create on urban infrastructure?
Urban migration will continue in Viet Nam because that's how we have seen all the countries move. The question is how will urban services keep up.
Two things need to happen. On the one hand, it is very important to invest in the countryside for poverty alleviation and for rural access to power, water and sanitation that can create jobs in multiple areas of development in the country, not just in big cities.
At the same time, urbanisation is a function of growth. The cities have been, and will continue to be, the end of the growth and backed by a strong agricultural sector. To that extent, therefore, the cities need to continue to ensure they have the revenue base to expand.
In other countries, what often has to happen is the devolution of some of those responsibilities to provincial levels because it is hard to plan all of these from a central level. I understand that is also part of the discussion here in Viet Nam.
Provincial levels are more able to be responsive to growth than city levels.
What is the biggest sustainable development challenge that Viet Nam faces?
I would say that the biggest one is the climate change because Viet Nam is a country that is obviously exposed to sea level rise, to different rainfall patterns.
How do you see Viet Nam's preparation for the impacts of climate change?
Viet Nam is preparing quite well, when we look at the rest of the world. Viet Nam is, sadly, one of those countries, along with others, that have many low-lying eco-zones, and depend on water from outside their borders. So, it is one of the countries that would be at the forefront of the impacts.
Because there is a realisation in Viet Nam about how much these impacts could affect the country's economic growth, I think Viet Nam is doing well. There is always a huge to-do list.
Viet Nam has been engaging with many international partners, including the World Bank, to try to tackle the impacts.
Over the weekend, I spent some time in the Cuu Long (Mekong) Delta where I witnessed some very interesting experiences.
Ten years ago the mangroves were being removed because of the high pressure on land. So the Government engaged with the World Bank to see how we could support the re-establishment of the mangroves. Mangroves are really a natural buffer against high tide, high waves and typhoons.
It is extraordinary to see what the Government has done and how well they have made use of the World Bank resources. I don't know how many kilometres of the mangroves have been restored, but I see how these mangroves, some 200m deep, are protecting the dykes and the houses on the other side of the dykes.
I think it was typhoon Linda [in 1999] that caused the Government to realise they had to come to the Bank to ask for assistance. The typhoon had tremendous negative impacts on human life and property.
Now it is very good to see how this has been rectified and the safeguard for the life of the people has been improved. That is the kind of integrated approach that needs to happen.
We teach the people not to cut down the mangrove trees so that now the people control the mangroves and take care of them so they don't get flooded out when the next typhoon hits.
Certainly, managing floods and drought becomes the absolute key to mitigating against climate shock and protecting against the sea-level rise. These need to be part of the solutions. — VNS
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