432 Vietnamese SOEs set to conclude equitization by 2015

Vietnam has set to conclude equitization of 432 state-owned enterprises (SOEs) by 2015, said a government official.

Pham Viet Muon, deputy head of the Permanent Steering Committee for Innovation and Enterprise Development of Vietnam, said at a conference on implementing tasks of SOEs restructuring during 2014- 2015 period in capital Hanoi on Tuesday that the country must speed up equitizing SOEs in the coming two years as the number of SOEs finishing equitization remained low after three years of implementation.

Vietnamese government e-portal quoted Muon as saying that equitization is the most important as well as the most complicated task in SOEs restructuring.

The official added that new measures and breakthroughs need to be imposed to gain further efficiency of equitization process, including focusing on equitizing state-run economic groups, divestments of non-core ventures and sales of unnecessary state shares at market prices.

SOEs will be operated solely in critical, essential and important areas of national defense and security, said Muon.

According to assessments released at the conference, slow equitization in Vietnam's SOEs during 2011-2013 period resulted from domestic economic difficulties, obstacles in implementing mechanisms as well as not strictly implementing direction.

During 2011-2013 period, Vietnam arranged business form of some 180 SOEs, 99 among which are equitized while 81 others are rearranged. As a result, the total number of equitized SOEs has reached 4,065 up to now.