Speaking with Kinh te & Do thi, master of economic management Hoang Thi Thu Phuong said that in order to mobilize social resources, transport infrastructure construction projects must have stable and attractive outputs and, more importantly, must have stable mechanisms and policies for investors.
According to you, what is the biggest difficulty in investing in Hanoi's transport infrastructure at present?
- Compared to the past, Hanoi has now resolved many problems and obstacles in the investment, construction and development of transport infrastructure, for example, the mechanisms and policies for this field have become more open and favorable. However, there are still many difficulties, especially in capital mobilization.
According to information provided by the City, in the period of 2025 - 2030, the Capital will need about 400,000 billion VND to invest in transport infrastructure, of which nearly 130,000 billion VND is for roads, 270,000 billion VND is for urban railways (UR). The City is currently only able to meet about 20% of the capital demand, 80% must be mobilized from other sources. It can be seen that this is a huge difficulty that Hanoi must solve to develop transport and reduce traffic congestion (TC).
Recently, many transportation projects in Hanoi have been adjusted, switching to using the budget instead of loans or socialized resources. What does that phenomenon indicate, madam?
- It should be seen as a specific adjustment for each project rather than for an entire policy system. Currently and in the future, socialized capital will still play a very important role in infrastructure development in general and in the transport sector in particular.
Projects that we see that borrowing and mobilizing external capital is not effective should be changed. Or due to urgent requirements, we cannot continue to wait for social capital, so we must switch to using the budget to speed up and shorten the progress of putting into operation.
It can be seen that the mechanisms and policies for transport projects have been revised and supplemented to be much more open. The Capital Law and Land Law have opened up corridors to mobilize social resources more easily.
In the near future, when mechanisms and policies are put into practice and adjustments are made to truly promote effectiveness, we will see that traffic projects are much more interested by investors, no longer indifferent as they are now.
So where and how should Hanoi mobilize capital to meet the huge target of infrastructure investment as set out?
- There are many ways to mobilize capital for transport projects such as: central budget, city budget, ODA loans..., and more importantly, socialized capital, mobilizing non-state enterprises to invest in transport infrastructure. However, mobilizing socialized capital is not easy.
Because up to now, transportation projects are often considered unattractive, with unstable output, difficult and long capital recovery, not to mention high profit margins. For example, there was a period when the whole country flourished with road investment projects in the form of BOT, many enterprises poured all their capital into it, but up to now, some enterprises have even asked to return or sell the project due to losses.
Therefore, to attract resources to develop transport infrastructure, state management agencies must have specific, clear and stable policies, ensuring output for each project.
Specifically, how to ensure output for the project, madam?
- Ensuring output for a transport project, simply put, is ensuring revenue to compensate for capital and generate profits for investors. This must also include stability, meaning that the mechanism, policies, and laws are stable and do not change continuously; in case of changes, investors who have invested in the project will still have stable revenue from the project.
As the current urban railway projects have been determined to be associated with the TOD model (urban development oriented towards rapid public transport, large blocks). In order for urban railway projects to become attractive and attract private investors, Hanoi must have clear policies.
For example, when investing in this urban railway line, how will the enterprise be rewarded with the right to exploit the TOD urban area on the line and for how long? When clarifying the rights, the enterprise will have the basis to calculate the investment plan and make a decision.
Or the Capital Law has allowed Hanoi to re-apply the form of public-private partnership, the BT contract type, which is simply exchanging land for infrastructure. This type of BT is the most popular and sought after by many enterprises, so it can create great attraction for transportation projects when applied. The problem is that the procedures and methods for exchanging land for infrastructure must be transparent and strict but not too difficult to implement, and the responsibilities must be clear to both the city and enterprises...
Enterprises participating in and investing in construction are the input for projects; ensuring capital recovery and a clear profit margin is the output guarantee for the project. Only stable and attractive output can encourage input.
For projects using budget capital and loans, what should be noted to avoid waste and achieve the highest efficiency?
- From an economic perspective, projects invested with the budget or international loans are difficult to make a profit. So to make them effective and avoid waste, they must meet three criteria: urgent; fast progress; and play the role of a "bait project".
Some projects are urgent and cannot wait for the long process of finding investors; the Government and Hanoi City must invest capital to quickly put them into operation, promoting the effectiveness of reducing traffic congestion. To promote efficiency and avoid price slippage and capital increase causing waste, these projects must be done quickly.
In the actual implementation process, there must be reasonable and accurate adjustments in capital flows between projects. Therefore, the disbursement of public investment capital is considered a criterion for evaluating management work for localities as well as ministries and branches.
On the other hand, many projects need to use the budget to invest with the goal of creating a “magnet, bait project” to attract social capital. For example, static traffic projects, especially underground and high-rise parking lots, etc. Hanoi can invest in construction, then bid for exploitation and business rights to both solve urgent needs and have an effective capital recovery plan.
Or like urban railway projects that come with the TOD urban model, the Government and the City need to invest capital to make investors see the effectiveness, or create the premise, connection, and support for other urban railway projects to attract social capital. Obviously, investing in an urban railway line that is already connected to many other lines will be more attractive than a single line. To make budget investment projects effective, they must be clearly classified and implemented quickly to make the most of every penny of capital spent.
Thank you very much!
16:03 02/03/2025
Source: https://kinhtedothi.vn/du-an-giao-thong-phai-co-dau-ra-on-dinh-hap-dan.html
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