Public investment, structural geographic disadvantage and provincial growth in Vietnam

Purpose This study aims to examine whether lagged implemented public investment is associated with subsequent provincial growth in Vietnam and whether the association is stronger under greater structural geographic disadvantage. Design/methodology/approach A balanced panel of 63 province-level units over 2010–2022 is analysed. A time-invariant index combines 2010 land area, remoteness from centrally governed urban centres and landlocked status. The main model estimates the conditional within-province association of annual real gross regional domestic product per capita growth with lagged implemented public investment and its interaction with the index, using province and year fixed effects and province-clustered inference. Findings The preferred estimates do not robustly support a positive public-investment association at mean disadvantage (p = 0.8224) or a stronger association under greater disadvantage (interaction p = 0.7595). All reported conditional-slope confidence intervals include zero. Timing and dynamic checks do not alter the conclusion that neither hypothesis receives robust empirical support. These annual-growth associations do not identify long-run productive returns. Originality/value The study tests geographic heterogeneity continuously across the national provincial panel with a moderator that excludes contemporaneous output and investment measures. It examines whether structural geographic disadvantage predicts a stronger conditional investment–growth association.