Abstract
According to the Saigon Times Daily, Deputy Director Duong Van Hoa said that
Vietnam National Coal-
Mineral Industries Group (Vinacomin) would build a
US$250mn deepwater port at Khe Ga Cape, in Binh
Thuan province. Khe Ga
Seaport will be utilised to import coal, and export aluminium and minerals.
The
port will be able to handle ships up to 80,000 deadweight tonnes
(DWT). The Ministry of Transport’s
Vinamarine International
Co-operation Department has stressed that the investments necessary in
Vietnam’s port sector are considerable if the sector is to keep up with
the wider economy. The key for
Vietnam is to sustain investor interest in
the sector. Thus far, there has been little evidence that investors
have
lost interest in Vietnam’s infrastructure sector.
Taking this and
other developments such as the downturn in the global economy into
consideration,
BMI’s newly released Vietnam Freight Transport Report
concludes that shipping traffic will increase by
an annual average of 6.7%
in 2009-2013, measured in tonnes per km. A number of factors underpin this
forecast. One is the still-realistic prospect of a long, export-led boom in
Vietnam, with annual GDP
growth likely to average 6.1% in 2009-2013, only
a little slower than the 7.8% rate achieved in the
preceding five-year
period. Infrastructure plans are also ambitious, with many new ports under
development.
Our overall outlook for the nascent freight transport
industry across the different modes is bullish despite
the recession.
Although the next two years will be tough, air freight will grow by an annual
average of
7.6% over the next five years. In road haulage, we have trimmed
our forecast to take account of the
economic slowdown, but we still see
turnover running ahead of the general rate of economic expansion in
Vietnam. We see road freight growing by an annual average of 7.5% over the
next five years, followed
closely by pipeline throughput (7.0%), maritime
freight (6.7%, as already mentioned) and rail (6.6%).
Full World Trade
Organization (WTO) membership, achieved in early 2007, can be seen as
supportive of
greater freight transport turnover relative to GDP across
all modes, particularly so for shipping. We now
expect total freight
carried growth across all modes, measured in million tonne-km (mntkm), to
average
6.8% per annum in 2009-2013.
Under BMI’s freight
transport rating system, Vietnam achieves a composite score of 54.3 out of
a
potential maximum of 100. Vietnam’s stronger points are freight
growth, transport infrastructure growth
and the transport intensity index,
which measures the dynamism of the country’s foreign trade. BMI
views Vietnam as being weaker in the other four categories: economic and
political long-term risks, and
the country’s regulatory and
competitive environment (corruption is a particular problem).
According to
our latest estimates, the total value of transport and communications GDP will
rise to
US$6.6bn in nominal terms by 2013, representing 4.5% of
Vietnam’s GDP.
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