On two days, October 29 and 30, 2001, the Government held its October regular meeting, discussing and resolving the following issues:

The Government heard the Minister of Trade reporting on the 2002 export promotion program. The Government determined that in 2002, the export growth rate must reach 10%. In order to well implement the 2002 export plan, the Government assigned the Ministry of Trade to assume the prime responsibility and coordinate with the Ministry of Planning and Investment and the concerned ministries and branches in performing the following jobs:

- To revise the export capability of all commodities so as to work out specific programs; pay special attention to boosting the exportation of commodity groups with competitive edges, employing intensive labor and consuming large quantity of domestic raw materials;

- To study and supplement polices on investment, finance, credit, tax,� so as to attract and stimulate all sources of various economic sectors, including overseas Vietnamese community, to participate in export and exports production activities;

- To supplement the policies on initial financial support, providing input and output support for the production and trading of export goods. To build infrastructure in service of export activities;

- To study and stably develop export markets for strategic commodities along the direction of market diversification, avoiding the dependence on few markets, combining export with import in order to increase export market and market share. To focus on the exploitation of Chinese, Japanese, Russian, Eastern Europe and American markets; maintain Western Europe and Middle East markets; and accelerate the penetration into African and Northern Europe markets.

- To study and consolidate the operation of trade associations along the direction of restructuring their organization, functions, tasks and personnel; enhance trade promotion activities and set up close relationship with trade societies and associations in the region and world.

The Government considered the report on development investment in five years, 2001-2005, presented by the Minister of Planning and Investment. It determined that in the 2001-2005 period, investment should aim to ensure the effective implementation of objectives set in the Resolution of the IX Party Congress. Special attention should be paid to diversifying investment capital sources, mobilizing as much capital from population as possible; determining investment orientations of breakthrough nature; concentrating the State�s investment in infrastructure construction, education, healthcare, social issues, and science and technology, as well as in poor, remote and deep-lying areas; assigning more responsibilities to the ministries, branches and localities on the basis of the overall plannings, thus minimizing spontaneous investment, which causes wastefulness and inefficiency; and making investment along the direction of building a rational economic structure.