The survey was based on questionnaires from the 500 largest Vietnamese enterprises (VNR500), the top 1000 income tax payers, and the 500 fastest-growing businesses in Vietnam.

Most businesses surveyed expressed pessimism about Vietnam’s economic prospects in 2013 although the country is on the way to recovery.

More than half of them stated that the economic situation will not improve in the second half of 2012, and some believed it may even get worse. However, they are all focused on overcoming difficulties and challenges to keep their business operations purring along.

They said they would accept possible losses in the last months of the year, and even see their staff being made redundant.

More than one third of businesses stressed the need to restructure their operations, but they found it difficult for lack of qualified personnel to foresee business risks and do good planning.

Local businesses, especially those small-to-medium-sized, attributed their limited production to the shortage of investment capital, as banks refuse to offer them incentive loans.

Even the larger private ones insisted that the Government should focus on economic restructuring instead of providing bailout packages and loosening monetary policy.

Source: VOV