Vietnam will need between $30 billion and $32 billion in official development assistance (ODA) for development projects in 2011-2015 period, the Ministry of Planning and Investment (MPI) said at press conference in Hanoi on June 3. The Dau tu newspaper quoted the MPI as saying that Vietnam will prioritize ODA for major projects, including expressways, airports, seaports and power plants. Vietnam should carefully consider selecting top-priority areas to use ODA in order to enhance efficiency of the capital, Victoria Kwakwa director of the World Bank said at the conference prior to the upcoming mid-term Consultative Group meeting. Vietnam disbursed $844 million in ODA in the first five months of this year, up 17.2% from a year earlier. It targets to disburse $3.5 billion in ODA in 2010 against the record high $4.1 billion in 2009, the MPI said. At the CG Meeting held in Hanoi late last year, foreign donors pledged a record of $8.063 billion in aid for the nation this year. The ministry noted that Vietnam will need total investments of VND6,340 trillion ($333 billion) for economic development projects in 2011-2015 period, up 1.9 folds in comparison with the sum for 2006-2010. The total investments in the next five years will account for at least 41.5% of the country’s GDP, the ministry estimated. Seventy percent of the sum will come from domestic sources and the remainder from foreign loans.
