In the context of business resources not being effectively exploited, policy burdens still hidden with a series of risks, the issuance of Resolution No. 02/NQ-CP brings many expectations...
Resolution 02/2024 clearly states that recently, institutional reform and business environment have tended to slow down, and some areas have even created unnecessary procedures, causing businesses to face risks. Difficulties related to specialized management of import and export goods, implementation of investment projects... continue to be major barriers.
Sharing about the difficulties in the food sector, Ms. Ly Kim Chi, Chairwoman of the Ho Chi Minh City Food and Foodstuff Association, said that one of the regulations that has the most prolonged and severe impact on food businesses is the problem in Decree 09/2016/ND-CP of the Government on fortifying micronutrients in food.
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| Enterprises expect business environment reform from Resolution No. 02 |
According to Ms. Chi, this problem has persisted for nearly 7 years, since 2017 until now, and food and foodstuff enterprises have been suffering many difficulties and losses every day from the mandatory requirement that all enterprises add iodine to salt and iron and zinc to flour used in food processing. This requirement is contrary to the principles of risk management, inconsistent with the recommendations of the World Health Organization, ineffective and inconsistent with international standards. In particular, this regulation even endangers health by forcing all people with sufficient or excess micronutrients to eat micronutrient-fortified foods, causing costs and many difficulties for food production and processing enterprises.
In Resolution No. 19-2018/NQ-CP dated May 15, 2018, the Government directed the Ministry of Health to study, amend and supplement Decree 09 in the direction of: Abolishing the regulation "salt used in food processing must be fortified with iodine" and abolishing the regulation "Wheat flour used in food processing must be fortified with iron and zinc". Instead, only food processing enterprises should be encouraged to use. On June 26, 2018, the Ministry of Health issued Plan No. 618 to amend Decree 09, but to date, the Ministry of Health has not yet implemented the amendment of this Decree.
Therefore, the Chairman of the Ho Chi Minh City Food and Foodstuff Association believes that it is time to change the way of implementing reforms, add more mechanisms to monitor and handle those who implement institutional reforms, and improve the national business environment to create breakthrough results. In fact, regulations on public discipline and responsibilities of heads of ministries and branches in implementing tasks assigned by the Government and the Prime Minister are still quite superficial and not specific, leading to many inappropriate regulations, greatly affecting businesses.
In many forums and in many places, businesses share more and more problems and shortcomings, but very few difficulties are resolved, causing the health of businesses to be "eroded and trust to decline".
It can be seen that if issuing the right policies is a necessary condition, then improving the effectiveness and efficiency of policy implementation is a sufficient condition for a truly favorable and business-friendly business environment.
In that context, many food industry enterprises expect that the restoration of the Reform Program and improvement of the business environment by issuing Resolution No. 02 dated January 5, 2024 will arouse the motivation and reform spirit of ministries, branches and localities. Thereby, promoting strong growth.
In fact, the Government's re-issuance of Resolution No. 02/NQ-CP will help significantly improve the business environment. The Resolution does not only stop at administrative procedure reform plans, improving national competitiveness but also creates a development foundation for the next stage based on digital transformation, digital economy with long-term plans.
The Government also assigned specific tasks to the implementing agencies and required coordination between ministries, branches and localities in performing the tasks set out in a separate section. Thus, the reform requirements are being raised more strongly, requiring ministries, branches and localities to participate in a substantive manner.
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