The Impact of the Economic Stimulus on Domestic, Private Enterprises

In the year 2008 and the first half of 2009, the world witnessed the unfolding and heavy repercussions of the global financial crisis which affected Vietnam, among others, through the reduction of investments inflow, lower global commodity prices and trade. The government of Vietnam has acted quickly with its stimulus package, including a 4% interest rate subsidy for enterprises with the objective of preventing the economy from falling further. While there are some anecdotal evidences about the effectiveness of the stimulus package, there is no systematic evidence of the impact of the stimulus package. This paper makes use of the PCI 2008 enterprise survey data, a unique dataset which is only recently made by available to investigate the impact of the 4% interest rate subsidy component of the stimulus package. We find strong statistical evidence that the 4% interest rate subsidy has positive and important impacts on the enterprises, easing the severe effects of the global crisis.Freeware; Global financial crisis, fiscal stimulus, interest rate subsidy, Vietnam.

Innovation and Export of Vietnam’s SME Sector

Innovation has long been considered an important factor for creating and maintaining the competitiveness of nations and firms. The relationship between innovation and exporting has been investigated for many countries. However, there is a paucity of research in Vietnam with respect to this issue. In this paper we examine whether innovation performed by Vietnam’s small and medium enterprises (SMEs) enhances their exporting likelihood. Using the recently released Vietnam Small and Medium Enterprise Survey 2005, we find that innovation as measured directly by ‘new products’, ‘new production process’ and ‘improvement of existing products’ are important determinants of exports by Vietnamese SMEs.Vietnam; Export; Innovation; Small and Medium Enterprise

Investigation on the effect of cross beams in single span bridges under dynamic aspect by using finite element method

In the 1980s and 1990s, most bridges in Vietnam employed simple beam for short-span river crossings that did not need navigation and mainly used the reinforced concrete T-beams or pre-stressed concrete. While the T-frame structure that has hang single span is widely applied for rivers that require navigation...The single girder is a basic span made of pre-stressed reinforced concrete T or I cross section, with spacing ranging from 2.2m to 2.6m, and the absence of diaphragms was a common feature of bridges built during this time period. All horizontal crashes almost have happened on the spans that did not have diaphragms. As a result, the impact force is concentrated mostly on the lateral girders, leading to total damage. Thus, researches to evaluate the effect of diaphragms in the distribution of horizontal impact forces as well as minimizing the damage in the span structures are crucial. This study focuses on simulating and studying the influence of the number and position of the diaphragms in terms of stress, deformation and damage when a collision occurs in order to propose additional and repair solutions to enhance the horizontal resistance of span

Does Better Provincial Governance Boost Private Investment in Vietnam?

A large literature asserts a causal relationship between the quality of economic governance and economic performance. However, attempts to establish such a link at an aggregate level have met with considerable methodological criticism. This paper seeks to overcome this limitation. We match a panel of Vietnamese enterprises from 2006-2010 with a unique panel dataset measuring sub-national economic governance, and then exploit rules on the terms of local leaders and the mandatory retirement age to try to estimate a causal link between local governance and domestic private investment. With one exception, we do not find a significant relationship between most aspects of local economic governance and private investment. The exception is transparency, which is strongly associated with higher investment, although the weakness of our instruments makes it difficult to determine the size of the effect. Our results have significant implications for policy, given the prevailing assumption that changes in the quality of local economic governance will spur improved economic performance

Computer Vision-Based Recognition of Pavement Crack Patterns Using Light Gradient Boosting Machine, Deep Neural Network, and Convolutional Neural Network

The performance and serviceability of asphalt pavements have a direct influence on people's daily lives. Timely detection of pavement cracks is crucial in the task of periodic pavement survey. This paper proposes and verifies a novel computer vision-based method for recognizing pavement crack patterns. Image processing techniques, including Gaussian steerable filters, projection integrals, and image texture analyses, are employed to characterize the surface condition of asphalt pavement roads. Light Gradient Boosting Machine, Deep Neural Network, and Convolutional Neural Network are employed to recognize various patterns including longitudinal, transverse, diagonal, minor fatigue, and severe fatigue cracks. A dataset, including 12,000 samples, has been collected to construct and verify the computer vision-based approaches. Based on experiments, it can be found that all three machine learning models are capable of delivering good categorization results with an accuracy rate > 0.93 and Cohen's Kappa coefficient > 0.76. Notably, the Light Gradient Boosting Machine has achieved the most desired performance with an accuracy rate > 0.96 and Cohen's Kappa coefficient > 0.88

Pre-treatment potential of electro-coagulation process using aluminum and titanium electrodes for instant coffee processing wastewater

This study aimed at investigating the potential of electrocoagulation (EC) process using Al-Al and Al-Ti electrodes for the pre-treatment of instant coffee processing wastewater. Effects of various operating conditions, including cell voltage, time of treatment, inter-electrode distance, pH of solution, solution conductivity and agitation speed on the removals of chemical oxygen demand (COD) and color were considered. The maximum removal of COD and color was achieved at 87% and 99%, respectively, corresponding to COD and color in the effluents of 359-384 mg/L and 58-101 Pt-Co. Biodegradability of treated wastewater was significantly improved since BOD5/COD increased from initial value of 0.42 to 0.65 after treatment. Nether mixing nor adding of electrolyte was recommended. Moreover, the COD removal kinetics during EC process appeared to follow the first-order kinetic model. The operating costs were also determined as a reference for cost assessment of the treatment

AMMONIA REMOVAL FROM SWINE WASTEWATER USING AN AEROBIC, ANOXIC FILTER AT A PILOT-SCALE IN THANH LOC BIOSTATION

Joint Research on Environmental Science and Technology for the Eart

Innovation and Export of Vietnam’s SME Sector

Innovation has long been considered an important factor for creating and maintaining the competitiveness of nations and firms. The relationship between innovation and exporting has been investigated for many countries. However, there is a paucity of research in Vietnam with respect to this issue. In this paper we examine whether innovation performed by Vietnam’s small and medium enterprises (SMEs) enhances their exporting likelihood. Using the recently released Vietnam Small and Medium Enterprise Survey 2005, we find that innovation as measured directly by ‘new products’, ‘new production process’ and ‘improvement of existing products’ are important determinants of exports by Vietnamese SMEs