Vietnamese transport contractors face opportunities to build high-speed railway infrastructure

Vietnamese construction contractors can now do everything related to transport infrastructure, so the North-South high-speed railway project will be an opportunity to affirm their construction capacity.

*A high-speed railway line in Europe. (Photo: PV/Vietnam+)*

The North-South high-speed railway project has a total length of 1,541km, with 60% being bridge structures, 30% being ground structures, and 10% being tunnel structures, and will be an opportunity to bring a huge amount of work to Vietnamese transport infrastructure construction contractors.

To prepare for this mega project, major domestic contractors have all thoroughly prepared resources and with "real-life" experience through two phases of the North-South Expressway Project, they certainly have enough capacity to carry out the construction and installation items.

Domestic contractors are capable of the given "task"

Always closely monitoring the formation process from the idea and pre-feasibility study report of the North-South high-speed railway project, Mr. Cao Dang Hoat, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Dinh An Group, assessed that this is a very large project, requiring contractors, consultants, and equipment suppliers with real capacity.

“With determination and awareness that these are projects that promote socio-economic development, this project is a new opportunity for Dinh An Group and the country, so in the past time, the unit has worked with foreign partner business organizations, Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City University of Transport, and other corporations to organize training classes for staff, workers, and technical experts with railway certificates to prepare for the project,” Mr. Hoat affirmed.

Pointing out the strength of Dinh An Group is the infrastructure thanks to human and financial capacity, Mr. Hoat acknowledged that from the perspective of technical standards, the high-speed railway also has overpasses, tunnels, and roadbeds like the expressway project, so domestic contractors will certainly take the initiative to undertake 100% of the workload.

“Our country has 20-30 contractors with the capacity to deploy high-speed railway infrastructure such as Deo Ca Group, Truong Son Corporation, Trung Nam Group, Trung Chinh, Cienco 4, Son Hai Group, Phuong Thanh, Hai Dang Group, Bac Trung Nam, Dinh An Group, General Company 319... The 'training ground' at the North-South Expressway Projects when facing difficulties such as the pandemic, price storms, material supply or land clearance delays but all completed, ahead of schedule with a huge amount of work in just over 2 years has shown financial capacity, experience, and workforce,” the Chairman of Dinh An Group gave evidence.

Mr. Pham Van Khoi, Chairman of the Board of Directors and General Director of Phuong Thanh Transport Investment and Construction Joint Stock Company (Phuong Thanh Tranconsin) said that high-speed railways include infrastructure items such as foundations, bridges, and tunnels with extremely high precision and stiffness, so they require more rigor and precision than road projects.

Therefore, Mr. Khoi believes that when implementing a project, design consulting and supervision should be hired from abroad to support and guide construction and quality management.

vnp_khach di tau duong sat toc do cao.jpg — *Passengers take a high-speed train in China. (Photo: Viet Hung/Vietnam+)*

According to Mr. Ngo Truong Nam, General Director of Deo Ca Group, for large-scale projects, Deo Ca Group proposes to give priority to domestic enterprises with management capacity, with specific products, to organize leadership, connection, and training for other enterprises and give priority to local enterprises where the project passes through.

Regarding the high-speed railway project, Mr. Nam suggested that there should be a mechanism to facilitate the participation of these enterprises. In particular, the items from the under-rail section down are similar in nature to road works (bridges, roads, tunnels), and should be assigned to experienced domestic enterprises. The components of locomotives, rolling stock, signal information systems, etc. should be considered for domestic enterprises to form a joint venture with foreign enterprises to implement.

To "anticipate" railway projects, Deo Ca Group has cooperated with universities to recruit and train high-quality human resources for the railway industry, the cooperation model includes ordering at the source and on-site training; studying the practical training process of the railway-metro industry in advanced countries such as France, the US, China, Japan... to selectively "import" training programs and experts.

The project needs to be divided into large packages.

According to the proposed roadmap, the North-South high-speed railway project will start construction in 2027 and complete the entire route in 2035. To complete the project, Vietnamese contractors have stated that the initial design survey, site clearance, and material supply must be done one step ahead of the project's commencement.

“It is necessary to ensure that when the project starts, the contractor will receive a clean site to organize the synchronous construction of all items, meeting the strict technical requirements of the high-speed railway,” said Mr. Cao Dang Hoat, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Dinh An Group.

To ensure progress, according to Mr. Hoat, State agencies need to proactively source capital, conduct careful design surveys, provide supervision advice to investors; correctly calculate the unit price coefficient, select contractors with financial capacity and experience; have a specific mechanism for material sources to be handed over to contractors to reduce intermediaries, avoid price increases; and complete 100% of site clearance work into a separate item before bidding to complete the project.

In addition to the fact that Vietnamese contractors must prepare a team of experienced high-speed railway personnel and invest in specialized machinery and equipment, the Chairman of Dinh An Group also recommended that the project should be divided into large packages, and joint ventures between general contractors with experience in implementing key state projects for construction, because if the packages are divided into small packages, the management and supervision work will be fragmented, costly and will not promote the efficiency of the workload.

“With the participation of the entire political system, with the way of thinking about how to do transport infrastructure projects like in the recent past, the contractor is confident that it can do it and ensures the progress milestone will be completed by 2035,” Mr. Hoat affirmed.

vnp_doan tau duong sat toc do cao.jpg — *The high-speed railway project will be an opportunity to bring a huge amount of work to Vietnamese transport infrastructure construction contractors. (Photo: Viet Hung/Vietnam+)*

Agreeing with this view, Mr. Pham Van Khoi, Chairman of Phuong Thanh Tranconsin Company, said that for the high-speed railway project to be fast and effective, the division of bidding packages must be "exact" to create conditions for contractors to maximize their capacity. The bidding mechanism needs to be further considered and applied to be able to choose the right and potential enterprises.

“Authorities need to select large, experienced contractors to represent large bid packages. The mechanism of appointing contractors like in the North-South Expressway project is an open point that needs to be studied and implemented,” Mr. Khoi suggested.

Deputy Minister of Transport Nguyen Danh Huy assessed that our country already has a team of contractors who can do everything related to transport infrastructure, so the high-speed railway project will be an unbeatable opportunity for construction contractors to make a strong move and take on the implementation of the work./.

Domestic contractors are capable of the given "task"

The project needs to be divided into large packages.

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