Analysis of the Relationship between Monocentric Growth and Productivity Spillovers in Vietnam: A Spatial Regression Approach

Abstract

After more than 30 years of reform (1986-2018), although Vietnam's economic growth has had certain fluctuations, has remained higher than the regional and world with an increase in average growth rate of 7% per year. However, if we consider the spatial dimension alone, the growth is not proportional. Growth and productivity are mainly concentrated on the major urban areas and their neighboring provinces. With this evidence, the purpose of this study is to verify whether there exists an extreme productivity growth value and a spillover effect in Vietnam using both spatial statistics and spatial econometric tests in survey data and remote sensing data. I-Moran test results show that there are close relationships between the light density at night, industrial density, enterprise efficiency, and labor quality. Furthermore, the I-Moran test provides evidence that productivity spillovers exist among several firms. To attract and expand production in target areas, the results suggest that infrastructure and incentives need to ensure positive spillovers at levels higher than those obtained from experimental research.