Vietnam's Huge Investment in the Shipbuilding Industry is Worthy of China’s Attention
2008/6/10 18:28:26
Vietnam is a new emerging star of the Northeast Asia. Some characteristics Vietnam is showing are not to be overlooked. Firstly, Vietnam is applying itself to political reformation; Secondly, the price of labor force in Vietnam is more comparative than China, which is attracting more and more foreign investment; Thirdly, the capital market of Vietnam is gradually opening, winning the favor of foreign capitals and becoming one of the booming markets. A few days ago, some figures in the shipbuilding circles said that, Vietnam would invest 2.5 billions of dollars into the development of the shipbuilding industry, inclusive of the items such as building new vessels, constructing ports and so on. Vietnam has long seashore, but the poor sea transportation force, insufficient harbor facilities and the fleet capacity become the bottle-neck of the development of Vietnam economy. At the present time, the Vietnam fleet has about 1,000 merchant vessels. Among these vessels, only a little more than 300 vessels are ocean going ones and most of the above 300 vessels are less than 20,000 DWT in capacity. As the Vietnam Shipbuilding Industry Group alleged, they had signed shipbuilding contracts with a total value amounting to 12.5 billions of dollars, including the contracts signed with the abroad factories worthy of 10 billions of dollars. As analyzed, this action of Vietnam is worthy of close attention for two reasons. One is that, the shipbuilding industry is a labor intensive one. Vietnam has the vantage of the intensive labor and the labor price is even lower than that in China. This provides the possibility for Vietnam to become a rival of China. The other reason is that Vietnam is engaging in developing ocean economy. The great increase of the shipbuilding ability will inevitably enhance the ocean force. Considering the problem with the south sea of China, it is a phenomenon worthy of great attention for China.
