Hanoi (VNA) – Despite lingering difficulties,businesses have recovered their confidence, the Private Economic Development ResearchBoard (Board IV) under the Prime Minister’s Administrative Reform AdvisoryCouncil underlined in its latest report on business situation in 2023 and outlook for 2024.

In the report, the board said that compared to its previoussurvey conducted in April 2023, businesses have become more optimistic, as the proportionof businesses rating the current macro-economic situation as positive/verypositive was 2.7 times higher than in the April survey.

Meanwhile, the current rate of firms assessing the economicsituation of their industry as positive/very positive was 2.5 timeshigher than that in the April survey, and the rate of positive assessmentsabout the macro-economic outlook for the next 12 months nearly 3 timeshigher.

At the same time, the rate of enterprises that intend toexpand their business scale strongly doubled, the report said, adding thatincrease was also seen in assessments on capital assess prospects, market outlookand efficiency of local administration’s supports, showing stronger confidenceof businesses.

However, businesses also voiced many difficulties. Among the 2,734 surveyed firms, 82.4% rated the economic situation for the second half of2023 as negative/very negative, while 69.1% showed the same assessment for theeconomic outlook in 2024.

Regarding business plan, 72.8% intended to shrink their business scale and haltor stop their operations in 2024.

The board stressed the need for the Government, ministries,sectors and local administrations to work harder to help business deal withfive major difficulties in order number, cash flow, administrative procedure andlaw implementation, risks of criminalisation of economic transactions, and loanaccess.

According to the Vice Chairman of the Prime Minister’s Administrative Reform AdvisoryCouncil and head of Board IV, 2024 is a year with many variables due to thecomplicated global situation that causes significant impact on the countries'internal strength, while the internal strength of businesses has been eroded.

Therefore, drastic and timely actions must be taken by thePrime Minister and the Government for ministries, sectors and localities tocontinue to effectively accompany with, support, and build trust for people andbusinesses to overcome difficulties, the official said.

The board recommended that the Government and the Prime Ministercontinue speeding up public investment disbursement to improve the quality ofmajor infrastructure systems in order to create long-term competitiveness, paygreater attention to human resources training, and improve the efficiency ofthe public administration and governance.

Alongside, it is necessary to build policies to support theprivate sector and transform the economy in green and circular directionto match the world’s sustainable development trend, it underscored./.