657,000 billion VND of public investment in 2024 mainly for transport infrastructure

On the morning of February 16, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh, Head of the State Steering Committee for important national projects and works, key to the transport sector (Steering Committee) chaired the 9th meeting of the Steering Committee.

2024 is the year of acceleration

Opening the meeting, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh said that the whole country is promoting three growth drivers, including investment drivers, including domestic investment, foreign investment, private investment and social investment.

Emphasizing that public investment plays an important role in leading and activating all social resources for development investment, the Prime Minister said that in 2024, the whole country will spend 657,000 billion VND on public investment, mainly in transport infrastructure investment, and strive to achieve a disbursement rate of at least 95%.

Along with the effectiveness of promoting growth momentum, focusing on disbursing public investment, with transportation projects put into operation will contribute to reducing logistics costs for businesses, reducing input costs, increasing the competitiveness of products, businesses and the economy; creating new development space because wherever the road goes, it opens up new development space, especially industrial development, urban areas, services, etc.

"That affirms that the Party and State's determination to focus on implementing three strategic breakthroughs, especially infrastructure breakthroughs, especially transport infrastructure, is the right and wise choice, a decisive factor for immediate and long-term development," the Prime Minister stated and affirmed that each transport project has its own mission, different functions and tasks, but in general, they are all very important and are strategic breakthroughs.

Focus - 657,000 billion VND of public investment in 2024 mainly for transport infrastructure — Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh said that in 2024, the whole country will spend 657,000 billion VND on public investment, mainly in transport infrastructure, and strive to disburse at least 95% (Photo: VGP).

The Prime Minister said that in recent years, investment and development of transport infrastructure has been promoted, creating a movement and trend, "not only the Central but also the local level can do it". 2021-2022 is the stage of initiating, preparing and approving projects, 2023 will be implemented simultaneously, 2024 is identified as the year to accelerate the implementation of key transport projects.

Assessing 2023 as a successful year for infrastructure development - one of the three strategic breakthroughs, the Prime Minister commended the localities, ministries, branches, investors, contractors, consultants and people whose projects have passed through for their great efforts and synchronous implementation, especially with the working spirit of "through Tet, through holidays", "overcoming the sun, overcoming the rain", "working in 3 shifts, 4 shifts", "eating quickly, sleeping urgently", promoting the implementation of transport infrastructure works and projects, the more they work, the more mature they become in terms of thinking, awareness and action.

The Prime Minister also pointed out that the progress of some projects is still slow due to prolonged investment procedures; slow site clearance; lack of initiative in materials due to regulatory problems; policies and incentives for units and individuals to focus on promoting projects are not timely; relevant entities need to coordinate more closely and effectively...

The Prime Minister requested the delegates attending the meeting to discuss, assess the situation, propose solutions to shorten the progress of works and projects, ensure quality, technical/aesthetic works, ensure labor safety, hygiene, and environmental landscape. At the same time, remove difficulties and obstacles in using ODA capital, using sea sand to build traffic works...

34 major projects, 86 national key component projects

According to the report of the Ministry of Transport, the country currently has 34 major projects, 86 important national component projects, key transport sector projects in 46 provinces and centrally-run cities. Of these, there are 5 railway projects, 2 airport projects, the rest are road projects, mainly expressways and belt roads in the Hanoi capital region, belt roads in Ho Chi Minh City.

The Eastern North-South Expressway Project has completed 9/11 component projects in the 2017-2020 period and the My Thuan - Can Tho project as planned, bringing the total length of expressway to 1,892 km, of which 475 km will be in 2023 alone; the remaining 2 projects are invested in the form of BOT contracts, investors and contractors are actively implementing to complete in accordance with the direction of the Prime Minister.

Focus - 657,000 billion VND of public investment in 2024 mainly for transport infrastructure (Figure 2). — Location of the intersection between Ring Road 4 - Capital region and Thang Long Avenue (Photo: Huu Thang).

For the 12 component projects in the 2021-2025 period, although there were many problems with construction sites and materials in the first year of implementation, investors and contractors have made efforts to organize construction and closely follow the set schedule.

For the 5 East-West expressway and beltway projects, the implementation progress is still slow, except for some packages managed by Ho Chi Minh City and Long An (Ring Road 3), Hanoi (Ring Road 4), Ba Ria - Vung Tau (Bien Hoa - Vung Tau expressway), Dak Lak and Khanh Hoa (Khanh Hoa - Buon Ma Thuot) which basically meet the plan.

Other expressway projects such as Tuyen Quang - Ha Giang section through Ha Giang province; Cao Lanh - An Huu; Ben Luc - Long Thanh are being implemented by investors and contractors closely following the set schedule.

The Nhon - Hanoi Railway Station urban railway project and the Ben Thanh - Suoi Tien project are being reviewed by Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, removing obstacles in the contract, training personnel, completing procedures on fire prevention and fighting, project acceptance, system safety certification to strive to operate the Nhon - Hanoi Railway Station section and the Ben Thanh - Suoi Tien project in July 2024.

For the Long Thanh international airport project, the packages under construction such as package 5.10 Passenger Terminal, the package for construction of works serving flight management have been directed by Vietnam Airports Corporation (ACV) and Vietnam Air Traffic Management Corporation (VATM) to actively implement and closely follow the progress.

The unstarted bidding packages of component project 1 to build headquarters of state management agencies, and component project 4 to build essential works are being implemented by the competent authorities for investment procedures and selection of investors.

The T3 Passenger Terminal Package of Tan Son Nhat International Airport was implemented by ACV, closely following the set schedule, and to date the disbursement has reached 2,477/10,825 billion VND (23%) .

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