The per capita income of Ho Chi Minh City this year rises around 12.9 percent year on year to over $5,100, with gross domestic product (GDP) growth reaching 9.6 percent, up 3.22 percent over last year, according to a recent conference in HCMC.

Both the economic growth and budget revenue targets of HCMC have been achieved and exceeded, showing signs that the local economy is gradually stabilizing, said a senior official of HCMC People’s Committee at the conference held on Saturday last week to review the socioeconomic situation of the southern city.

Le Hoang Quan, Chairman of HCMC People’s Committee said the more important factors for economic growth in 2014 is that the quality of growth is more stable with increasing efficiencies  in many fields.

"Earlier, we estimated GDP growth rate in 2014 to reach 9.5 percent, but the actual results we achieved exceed by 0.1 percent to 9.6 percent. Not only that, looking back over the GDP growth rate for each quarter and comparing to the same period in 2013, we see it showed gradual and stable growth," Quan said.

HCMC People’s Committee also identified that there was a shift in economic structures in the right direction in 2014, in which services accounted for 59.6 percent share of GDP, and industry and construction accounted for 39.4 percent.

Especially, per capita income has increased significantly. Per capita income in 2013 reached $4,545, but in 2014, that number increased to $5,131, up by 12.89 percent year on year.

Thai Van Re, director of the Department of Planning and Investment, said that given the recently obtained results, the per capita income has surpassed the target of $5,000 of per capita income set by the 9th HCMC Party Congress in 2010.

Report on the status of budget revenues, Ms. Dao Thi Huong Lan, director of the HCMC Department of Finance, said there is a good sign: the city's total revenue in 2014 reached VND249.87 trillion ($11.75 billion), exceeding VND23.56 trillion ($1.1 billion) over the plan set at the beginning of this year.

According to the HCMC People's Committee, though the economic recovery will be underway in 2015, there will be also potential problems and so, it proposed 14 groups of solutions to be conducted to promote continued stable economic growth next year.

Those solutions will focus on resources for implementing the restructuring the economy, especially to raise their efficiencies for state-owned enterprises.

Meanwhile, the solutions will help improve the investment and business climate, simplify administrative procedures, and enhance the application of information technology and administrative reform in order to create more favorable conditions for businesses.