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Vietnam employs around 700,000 incompetent civil servants at a cost of about VND17 trillion ($760 million) per year, said Bui Sy Loi, the vice chairman of the National Assembly’s Committee on Social Issues.
To put this figure into perspective, Vietnam's gross domestic product was $193.6 billion last year.
He estimated as many as 30 percent of the current 2 million-plus people on the state payroll are not competent enough to carry out their duties.
The Home Affairs Ministry has plans to reduce the number of employees on the state payroll in various sectors by at least 10 percent in the next five years.
About 10,000 civil servants lost their jobs in the first half of 2016 as part of government efforts to balance the budget. However, the figure fell far short of the target of removing 40,000 civil servants, or 1.5 percent of the current 2.6 million payroll, Vietnam News Agency cited Minister of Home Affairs Le Vinh Tan as saying.
The minister expects 100,000 civil servants to be made redundant between now and 2020.
Economist Tran Xuan Cau estimated by cutting the number of people on the state payroll by a third, the government could save up to VND100 trillion.
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