Vietnam estimated on Tuesday its consumer prices in December would be 12.63 percent higher than a year earlier, rising at the fastest rate in a decade due to rising cost of housing, food and fuel prices. Rising foreign investment in Vietnam a year after the country joined the World Trade Organisation also contributed to shooting up consumer prices, economists said.
The government's General Statistics Office estimated consumer prices this year would be on average 8.3 percent higher than last year. In December alone, prices were set to rise 2.91 percent from November, accelerating from the 1.2 percent rise between last month and October.
With economic growth estimated at 8.44 percent this year the government has failed to achieve its target to keep this year's price increases below the economic growth. Inflation came near the economic growth in 2005 when prices rose 8.4 percent and the south-east Asian country's GDP expanded 8.44 percent. Vietnam's annual consumer price inflation last reached two digits in October 2004, when it hit 10.3 percent.