“Vietnamese businesses can create general products similar to those imported from China or other countries, but we have yet to establish a comprehensive economic system with continuous, stable, and sustainable policies for long-term production,” said Dr. Nguyen Quoc Viet, deputy director of the Institute for Economic and Policy Research (VEPR), in an interview with The Saigon Times. Cheap goods from China from a market economy perspective The Saigon Times: The influx of cheap Chinese goods is a challenge for many ASEAN countries such as Thailand, Indonesia and Malaysia. What do you think about this? Is it a short-lived issue, or will this pressure continue to grow because China, as a large nation, has reached a production scale that requires constant market expansion? Dr. Nguyen Quoc Viet: This is not a new issue. In the context of fluctuating external demand, such as the severe downturn during the Covid-19 pandemic and in 2023 due to trade tensions between China and the West, there was a surplus of Chinese-produced goods. As a result, Chinese businesses had to aggressively seek new markets, with ASEAN being the first target, while their businesses benefited from strategies involving low-cost competition. Moreover, China pursues large-scale production policies. With […]