Crafting new growth model for Dong Nai

With its new stature as Vietnam’s seventh city, Dong Nai is envisioned as a strategic transit hub for the Southeastern region, serving as a connector among the maritime, aviation, border-gate, and domestic economies while coordinating interregional economic flows. The city aims for rapid, modern, and sustainable growth worthy of its role as a major growth pole of Southern Vietnam and the country.

Long Thanh Airport is the driving force in restructuring the development space and renewing Dong Nai City’s growth model.

To achieve that goal, one of the most urgent requirements facing Dong Nai is to renew its growth model.

The pressing need for new growth model

During the 2026–2030 period, Dong Nai City aims to achieve double-digit economic growth. To realize this target, the city has identified growth model reform as one of its most pressing priorities.

In recent years, Dong Nai’s existing growth model has generated significant socio-economic gains. However, under the new development context, its limitations in planning, human resources, and investment attraction have become increasingly evident.

Dong Nai City has long been regarded as one of the country’s industrial capitals. However, the attraction of foreign direct investment (FDI) into the city’s industrial parks still faces various constraints. Meanwhile, it has yet to match either its potential or the demands of the new development phase.

According to Deputy Secretary of the Dong Nai Party Committee and Chairman of the City People’s Committee Nguyen Van Ut, Dong Nai currently hosts around 2,300 FDI projects with a total registered capital of approximately US$45 billion. However, the bulk of these projects remains concentrated in processing and labor-intensive industries with relatively low added value. In addition, linkages between FDI enterprises and domestic firms remain weak, and the share of high-tech projects remains limited.

Meanwhile, pressure is mounting on social housing, healthcare, education, and urban infrastructure systems serving the workforce.

More importantly, one of the major challenges confronting Dong Nai in its new development phase is the quality of its workforce. According to Chairman Nguyen Van Ut, the city’s human resources currently fall short of meeting development demands, particularly in high technology, logistics, digital transformation, and innovation.

Positioning Long Thanh Airport as the nucleus of spatial restructuring

At a May 18 working session between a central working delegation and the Dong Nai City Party Standing Committee, Politburo member and Head of the Central Policy and Strategy Commission Nguyen Thanh Nghi noted that Dong Nai now possesses new development advantages in land resources, population, and transport infrastructure. “With Long Thanh International Airport, Dong Nai City possesses all five modes of transportation,” Nguyen Thanh Nghi emphasized.

At the same meeting, Party General Secretary and State President To Lam instructed Dong Nai City to coordinate with ministries and agencies to ensure progress on key projects, including Long Thanh Airport Phase 2, the Bien Hoa–Vung Tau railway, airport connectivity routes, and interregional infrastructure projects. Long Thanh must be positioned within a wider connectivity network linking Ho Chi Minh City, Tay Ninh, the Mekong Delta, the Central Highlands, the south-central coastal region, and cross-border economic corridors so that it can become a genuine driver of spillover growth.

“To renew its growth model, Dong Nai must restructure its development framework and create new growth drivers. The city needs to shift from growth based on land, labor, and processing activities toward growth driven by science and technology, innovation, and data. Accordingly, the city should prioritize strategic sectors such as high-tech manufacturing, semiconductors, artificial intelligence (AI), smart logistics, and emerging economic models, with digital transformation placed at the center of the agenda,” Nguyen Thanh Nghi said.

At the same working session, Party General Secretary and State President To Lam called on Dong Nai City to craft a new growth model capable of taking the locality beyond the limits of a traditional industrial center. Its new status, he noted, requires Dong Nai to grow through productivity, technology, knowledge intensity, innovation capacity, and stronger spillover effects for domestic enterprises, rather than relying heavily on industrial land, project numbers, and low-cost labor. Investment attraction, therefore, must adopt higher selection standards, prioritizing projects that bring technology, governance capacity, supply chains, training capability, and stronger linkages with domestic enterprises. Meanwhile, the city should review and adjust projects that consume large land areas, employ outdated technology, make limited contributions, and place excessive pressure on infrastructure, the environment, and social welfare. “Dong Nai’s land resources, labor force, and infrastructure are strategic assets that must be allocated toward long-term value,” To Lam stressed.

Particularly, Party General Secretary and State President To Lam stressed that Dong Nai must make Long Thanh Airport the nucleus of its development. From Long Thanh, the city must develop an airport urban ecosystem, aviation services, trade, finance, conferences, exhibitions, education, healthcare, tourism, and other high-quality services. He said the city should soon formulate a comprehensive plan to develop the Long Thanh Airport urban area, Nhon Trach, and the surrounding areas.

By P. Tung – Translated by M.Nguyet, Minho