Hà Nội Party Committee Chairman Vương Đình Huệ delivers a speech at the meeting in Hà Nội on Thursday. — VNA/VNS Photo Doãn Tuấn

HÀ NỘI — Authorities in Hà Nội discussed measures to develop the capital’s economy while keeping the COVID-19 outbreak under control at a meeting on Thursday.

Secretary of the Hà Nội Party Committee Vương Đình Huệ said the most urgent task for Hà Nội and the whole country was to prevent COVID-19 from spreading, together with measures to fulfill the socio-economic targets set by the city for 2020.

Since the virus emerged, municipal authorities have had scenarios to assess the impact of the outbreak on the city’s socio-economic development, along with recovery measures, he said.

Hà Nội had mapped out scenarios based on the first two months, according to vice chairman of the city’s People’s Committee, Nguyễn Doãn Toản.

During that time, the hardest hit sector was tourism as the number of visitors from China, Việt Nam’s biggest source, dropped by 93.5 per cent, followed by the Republic of Korea (51.4 per cent), while domestic tourists fell 27 per cent.

Export turnover dropped 19 per cent and foreign direct investment (FDI) attraction reached only US$240.2 million.

Assessing the impacts of COVID-19, Toản said the tourism sector was the hardest hit. Industrial production was also negatively affected as 15 per cent of export turnover and 40 per cent of import turnover depend on the Chinese and Korean markets.

The outbreak has also affected FDI sources from Japan, South Korea and China, which account for around 41.5 per cent of the city’s total FDI capital.

Based on the outcomes in January-February, Hà Nội has drafted three growth scenarios and selected the first one to strive for, under which, the city aims for a 7.51 per cent Gross Regional Domestic Product (GRDP) growth in 2020 and 7.37 per cent on average during 2016-20.

According to the city’s first scenario, the outbreak would be controlled at the end of the first quarter and the city would start to regain growth from the second quarter and speed up in the final two quarters to reach the target of 7.51 per cent in GRDP.

Secretary of Hà Nội's Party Committee Huệ said Hà Nội put COVID-19 prevention and control as the top priority to help create a stable environment for production and trade activities to help the economy to recover.

He asked authorities to complete and issue action plans to help tackle difficulties for businesses.

He also asked the city to be flexible in budget management and continue to promote administrative reforms as part of measures to help reach the city’s socio-economic development targets. — VNS