This series on China is pretty amazing. It covers important, strategic and ambitious projects that the neighboring country of us Vietnamese has been working on.
It is understandable to compare Vietnam to China. There are a lot of similarities shared between the two countries in terms of history, culture, political systems and economic models. Yet, the difference I notice is that China has been light years ahead with regards to not only generating money/growth, but also investing in growth.
In Vietnam, we don’t have that kind of projects covered in the series above. We have been working on the first ordinary metro for almost a decade and the project is only about 60% done. In the meantime, China has super fast trains operated in the country and a magnificent highway network. We don’t have the advances in technology that China has boasted about for years. On the global stage, we don’t command the respect that China does. If some of universities in China are now among the world’s best, those in Vietnam still lag so far behind.
Sad to say, but I have to admit that Vietnam blew a chance some 40-50 years ago. We used to be the Singapore of the region. Now, we are so far behind our peers and neighbors, and there aren’t many reasons that can convince me that things will be turned around in the future.
Minh Quang Duong 