On May 10, in Hanoi, the State Bank of Vietnam and the Saigon Times jointly organized Vietnam Banking Forum 2023 themed “Monetary Policy in Turbulent Times”.
Vietnam Banking Forum 2023 themed “Monetary Policy in Turbulent Times”
In his opening speech, SBV Deputy Governor Pham Thanh Ha emphasized that the macro-economic situations in 2022 and during the first months of 2023 witnessed rapid changes that exceeded all previous expectations. He noted that the global economy had quickly moved from a deep recession during the COVID-19 pandemic to record high inflation rates, forcing many countries to tighten their monetary policies.
In light of a complicated and unpredictable international environment, Vietnam, being a small and highly open economy, has faced many difficulties and challenges; the monetary policy management, especially the management of the interest rates, the exchange rates and the credit growth, has had many difficulties in addressing harmoniously several contradictory objectives, such as: (i) supporting the economic recovery after the pandemic while ensuring a strict control over the inflation in the context of a hike in the commodity prices around the world; (ii) reducing the pressures of depreciation on the VND while still maintaining the stability of the common interest rates; (iii) protecting the safety of the banking sector while still ensuring to meet the demand for credit of the economy, and conducting support measures to resolve the difficulties for the borrowers.
According to the SBV Deputy Governor, these tasks are highly challenging, but the SBV has managed the monetary policy and the banking operations in an active and flexible manner, coordinated closely with the Ministries and government agencies to help the business community and the people to overcome their difficulties, and to accomplish the set macro targets.
The panelists in the discussion session at the Forum
At the Forum’s discussion session, the panelists provided in-depth analyses of the current situation related to the monetary and banking operations, as well as the lessons learnt from the monetary policy management in 2022; identified the difficulties in 2023 and came up with several policy recommendations to resolve the current difficulties and challenges, achieving the objectives of a rapid and sustainable economic growth in 2023 and the following years.
According to the panelists, in the context of many uncertainties in the global economy, the domestic economy is also facing numerous problems in various areas, such as the slow disbursement of public investment; the legal obstacles; a weakening real estate market; and the pressures on the corporate bond market; etc. Therefore, it is necessary to ensure the consistent collaboration among the Ministries, agencies and local authorities to develop overall policy packages that aim to enhance the coherence among the policies in general, and the effectiveness of the monetary policy in particular.
Le Hang