This paper aims to fill this gap through the investigation of the influence of formal economic institutions such as market entry, property right protection, anti-corruption mechanisms, and informal charges on private investment across provinces in Vietnam. The empirical results suggest that the deregulation of market entry is essential for private investment. | Prospects of economic growth & development 1. An overview After a rather long time of being able to maintain a high and comparatively stable economic growth of yearly (in the years 2003-2007), during the last two years we have witnessed the national economic growth slowing down to 6%, more or less ( in 2008 and in 2009). numerical data about macroeconomic targets show an unstable situation incurred by high inflation, huge trade deficit, and by some other imbalances in the economy. the above-mentioned situation is caused by unusual and reverse developments in the world economy and by inherent weaknesses accumulated in the previous years but are not timely tended to. since the mid-2007, there appeared unstable signs in the world economy. the price of many commodities, especially raw materials, fuel, and food, increased sharply and affected our economy considerably. prices of many domestic commodities rose quickly causing high inflation in 2008 (23%), which, in turn, caused difficulties for production and daily activities. in order to deal with this situation, the government gave priority to inflation control, macroeconomic stabilization, social 12 Economic Development Review - January 2011 in 2011 welfare and a reasonable growth rate. the government’s measures pushed back inflation in time, and stabilized production and public life. from september 2008, the financial crisis and economic recession originating from the United states have spread all over the world and affected almost all economies, especially ours in a negative way. these crisis and recession particularly affected vietnamese export, investment attraction, tourist receipt and other foreign exchange revenues. they also slowed down economic growth, and threatened the macroeconomic stabilization and social security. the government has promptly promulgated policies to stimulate the economy, carried out a program to supply credit at a subsidized interest rate to push up production and
