Ho Chi Minh City Leads Vietnam’s Ambition for Growth through Science and Technology
February 6, 2026 — Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam
Ho Chi Minh City is taking a pioneering role in advancing Vietnam’s vision of economic growth driven by science, technology, innovation, and digital transformation. Recognizing its unique geopolitical advantages, economic position, and institutional autonomy, the southern metropolis is emerging as the frontline in shifting the country’s development model towards a knowledge-based economy.
Seminar Highlights Vision and Challenges
On February 5, the Ho Chi Minh City Department of Science and Technology convened a high-level seminar focused on transforming the city’s growth model through science and technology, innovation, and digital transformation. The seminar was co-chaired by Mr. Nguyen Hai Minh, Deputy Director of the General Economic Department under the Central Policy and Strategy Board, and Mr. Lam Dinh Thang, Director of the Ho Chi Minh City Department of Science and Technology.
Experts and policymakers gathered to discuss the city’s current status, obstacles, and strategies to successfully lead Vietnam’s transformation into a dynamic, innovation-driven economy, with an aspiration towards double-digit economic growth.
Embracing the Future: From Aspiration to Action
At the seminar, Dr. Tran Du Lich stressed the urgency of embracing this growth trajectory, particularly given Vietnam’s impending demographic shift towards an aging population. He reiterated that hesitating on this goal is not an option if Vietnam is to escape the middle-income trap. “If we don’t do it now, we never will,” he declared.
Dr. Lich highlighted the significant geopolitical and administrative advantages Ho Chi Minh City currently holds, enhanced further by recent decentralization measures under resolutions such as Resolution 260, 98, and 222. He noted that these powers position the city ideally to spearhead the transition towards an innovation-led economy and to set examples nationwide.
Key Issues and Strategic Directions
Dr. Tran Du Lich outlined several crucial questions that must be addressed:
- Where is Ho Chi Minh City in its development journey?
- What obstacles impede transformation?
- How should it transition toward science and technology-driven growth?
- What solutions can overcome these hurdles?
He reflected on the slow progress despite two decades of discussions about shifting from extensive to intensive growth models, urging a reinvigorated focus on combining legacy industries—such as textiles, footwear, and wood products—with green and digital technologies to enhance competitiveness.
Moreover, Dr. Lich emphasized that policy innovation is vital. With increased institutional autonomy, the city can now make swifter decisions regarding investment, land, budgets, and talent acquisition, no longer constrained by cumbersome “request-and-grant” mechanisms.
To accelerate innovation, he proposed establishing a large-scale Innovation and Venture Capital Fund modeled on market principles, co-investing with private sectors to support technology startups, university spin-offs, and R&D endeavors. The public sector’s role would be to provide early-stage seed capital, thereby catalyzing wider social investment.
Attracting Quality Investment
Dr. Lich called for refocusing foreign direct investment (FDI) strategies, prioritizing investors contributing to technology transfer, R&D, and high value-added activities like chip design and research centers rather than traditional packaging and processing roles. He also advised integrating FDI enterprises closely with local businesses to build competitive domestic enterprises.
Addressing the city’s state-owned enterprises, which are among the country’s largest, Dr. Lich urged full implementation of Politburo Resolution 79 for these entities. Currently fragmented, these SOEs must undergo reform to unlock breakthrough potential that contributes meaningfully to innovation-led growth.
National Perspective: Deputy Director Nguyen Hai Minh’s Insights
Mr. Nguyen Hai Minh outlined the central government’s ambitious project to renew Vietnam’s national development model, aiming for sustainable double-digit economic growth. He underscored science and technology as integral across six major pillars of national development: economy, society, culture, environment, foreign relations and security, and institutional reform.
Highlighting the fierce international competition among knowledge- and technology-based economies, Mr. Minh noted Vietnam’s critical juncture. With the demographic dividend nearing its end and the aging population on the horizon, Vietnam must seize this decisive moment to transition into a high-income, developed country.
He asserted Ho Chi Minh City’s vital role as the country’s growth engine, calling for the city to serve as a testing ground for new development models encompassing digital economy, creative industries, high-tech manufacturing, finance, logistics, healthcare, and education.
Readiness and Next Steps
Responding to the discourse, Mr. Lam Dinh Thang, Director of the Department of Science and Technology, expressed the city’s readiness to become a national policy testing center for science and technology innovation and digital transformation. However, he emphasized the need for a robust legal framework to enable the sandbox mechanism for piloting and experimentation in policy and governance.
The Department remains open to expert input and actively encourages collaboration to further develop mechanisms conducive to bold innovation and rapid transformation.
Conclusion
Ho Chi Minh City stands at the forefront of Vietnam’s drive to harness science, technology, and innovation as engines of future growth. With increased autonomy, strategic investment, and a commitment to pioneering development models, the city is poised to lead not only itself but also the entire country toward a prosperous, sustainable, and cutting-edge economy.
Source: Báo Sài Gòn Giải phóng via ttbc-hcm.gov.vn
