Vietnamese rely on more income sources amid inflation fears: survey

The survey discovered that 34% of respondents were relying on multiple sources of income in January, compared to 20% in July last year.

More than 10,000 respondents were questioned for the survey by market research company Infocus Mekong Research.

Trading in stocks, funds and currency have become the top secondary sources of income, according to 35% of respondents, followed by property rent/sales and online sales.

Up to 27% of consumers expect the coming year to be worse than the last, up from 18% in July, it said.

Consumer confidence (measured among 11 spending categories) has dropped from 63 points to 57 points since July, indicating uncertainty in the market, fueled by the burst real estate bubble and high inflation.

“Inflation has jumped to the forefront of consumer fears, followed by pollution, economic slowdown and unemployment,” said the report.

However, full-time employment is at its highest since pre-Covid days, even with the large number of real estate and factory lay-offs, and this bodes well for the economy.

Economic expert Nguyen Bich Lam, former general director of the General Statistics Office, said that it would be not easy to keep inflation at 4.5% this year as targeted.

The demand-pull and cost-push inflation will put pressure on the country’s efforts to control inflation amid surging demand and strengthening of the U.S. dollar, which increased import prices, he said.

Demand for petrol and electricity – the two important commodities for production and consumption – will increase in 2023, and a hike in the electricity retail price is expected this year as well, Lam added.

Last year, Vietnam’s Consumer Price Index, which measures inflation, rose 3.15% from 2021.