page_title: Economy of Vietnam
section_title: Energy, mining and minerals
hierarchical_section_title: Economy of Vietnam / Economic sectors / Energy, mining and minerals
caption_attribution_description: English: Dau Tieng Solar Power Project, bird's eye view of installation works at PV Arrays
context_page_description: The economy of Vietnam is a socialist-oriented market economy, which is the 44th-largest in the world as measured by nominal gross domestic product and 27th-largest in the world as measured by purchasing power parity. Vietnam is a member of Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation, Association of Southeast Asian Nations and the World Trade Organization.
  Since the mid-1980s, through the Đổi Mới reform period Vietnam has made a shift from a highly centralized command economy to a mixed economy that uses both directive and indicative planning through five-year plans with support from an open market-based economy. Over that period, the economy has experienced rapid growth. In the 21st century, Vietnam is in a period of being integrated into the global economy. Almost all Vietnamese enterprises are small and medium enterprises. Vietnam has become a leading agricultural exporter and served as an attractive destination for foreign investment in Southeast Asia. In the current period, Vietnam's economy relies largely on foreign direct investment to attract the capital from overseas to support its continual economic rigor.
context_section_description: Petroleum is the main source of energy, followed by coal, which contributes about 25% of the country's energy (excluding biomass). Vietnam's oil reserves are in the range of 270–500 million tons. Oil production rose rapidly to 403,300 barrels per day (64,120 m³/d) in 2004, but output is believed to have peaked and is expected to decline gradually.
  In 2003, mining and quarrying accounted for 9.4% of GDP, and the sector employed 0.7% of the workforce. Petroleum and coal are the main mineral exports. Also mined are antimony, bauxite, chromium, gold, iron, natural phosphates, tin, and zinc.
  Crude oil was Vietnam's leading export until the late 2000s, when high-tech electrical manufactures emerged to become the biggest export market (by 2014, crude oil comprised only 5% of Vietnamese exports, compared to 20% of all exports in 1996). This is in part because Vietnam crude oil peaked in 2004, when crude oil represented 22% of all export earnings. Petroleum exports are in the form of crude petroleum because Vietnam has a very limited refining capacity. Vietnam's only operational refinery, a facility at Cat Hai near Ho Chi Minh City, has a capacity of only 800 barrels per day (130 m³/d). Refined petroleum accounted for 10.2% of total imports in 2002. As of 2012, Vietnam had only one refinery, the Dung Quat refinery, but a second one, the Nghi Son Refinery was planned and was scheduled for construction in May 2013.
  Vietnam's anthracite coal reserves are estimated at 3.7 billion tons. Coal production was almost 19 million tons in 2003, compared with 9.6 million tons in 1999. Vietnam's potential natural gas reserves are 1.3 trillion cubic meters. In 2002, Vietnam brought ashore 2.26 billion cubic meters of natural gas. Hydroelectric power is another source of energy. In 2004, Vietnam confirmed plans to build a nuclear power plant  with Russian assistance, and a second by a Japanese group.
caption: Dau Tieng Solar Power Complex is the largest solar farm in Southeast Asia
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