Headache with paperwork and land fund
The dialogue was attended by Vice Chairman of Ho Chi Minh City People's Committee Duong Anh Duc, leaders of Thu Duc City People's Committee and 21 districts, along with representatives of departments, branches and sectors in the city.
Opening the dialogue, Director of the Department of Education and Training of Ho Chi Minh City Nguyen Van Hieu said that the dialogue had the participation of 108 enterprises operating in the field of education and training.
These are businesses representing more than 1,000 non-public units currently operating, including private schools, foreign language centers, information technology centers, life skills education centers, study abroad consulting centers and other service organizations in Ho Chi Minh City.
"Non-public schools contribute to sharing the pressure on school places for people in the context of a constantly increasing population. Of which, the highest proportion is preschool with more than 50%, followed by high school with more than 20% of students studying at non-public facilities. In addition, the facilities also meet the diverse learning needs of the city's people with many different segments such as schools implementing Vietnamese programs, Vietnamese programs integrated with foreign programs and schools with foreign elements, teaching foreign programs...", said the Director of the Department of Education and Training of Ho Chi Minh City.
However, according to Ms. Ta Thi Minh Thu, Head of the Department of Management of Non-Public Educational Institutions (Department of Education and Training of Ho Chi Minh City), businesses currently have many concerns regarding legal documents for establishment, permission for educational activities, change of operating locations; loan sources, tax policies, and land funds for educational investment.
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Ms. Ta Thi Minh Thu synthesizes some recommendations from non-public establishments. |
Mr. Nguyen Ba Linh, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Viet My Education Group (Binh Chanh District) - a unit with nearly 10 years of operation in the field of education and training with a current scale of more than 3,000 students, said: "One of the difficulties we are facing is the land fund issue. When there is a need to expand the facility, the investment cost for site clearance is quite high. Therefore, we need a mechanism to support businesses in site clearance and borrowing capital".
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Chairman of Vietnam-USA Education Group proposed ideas at the dialogue |
From another perspective, according to Mr. Ngo Ngoc Luyen, the investor and direct operator of Nam My Kindergarten (Binh Chanh district), after the impact of the Covid-19 epidemic, many staff and teachers could not survive and had to quit their jobs.
Private preschools in particular must be flexible in many measures to maintain operations. Among them, the difficulties for school owners are social insurance payment policies and tax obligations. Representatives of the unit hope that the city will have more preferential tax policies to share the difficulties with the schools.
Sharing the same view, Ms. Dao Thi Tin, Director of Thien An Phuc Company Limited - the investor of 4 private schools in Go Vap district and Thu Duc city, stated that in reality, after the Covid-19 pandemic, at many times the number of teachers in schools was larger than the number of children attending school.
"We have to hold on to operations, try to ensure income, and pay social insurance for teachers. However, it is extremely difficult to pull the plug, and now the unit has to receive a decision to fine due to social insurance debt," said Ms. Dao Thi Tin.
In response to the above concerns, Mr. Mai Phuong Lien, Deputy Head of the Financial Planning Department (Department of Education and Training of Ho Chi Minh City) informed that Ho Chi Minh City is currently implementing an investment stimulus program, in which the maximum loan interest support period is 7 years.
In particular, the condition for the unit to receive the support policy is that the loan capital ratio does not exceed 70% of the basic investment capital, meaning that the investor has 30% of the counterpart capital. The city budget supports all loan interest, however, the support policy does not apply to site clearance costs.
Regarding the social insurance policy for school owners, Mr. Nguyen Quoc Thanh, Deputy Director of Ho Chi Minh City Social Insurance, said that at present, owners of educational establishments are not subject to compulsory social insurance.
Currently, in the draft Law on Social Insurance, this subject has been added to the subjects to which social insurance policies are applied. In the future, when the Law on Social Insurance is passed, business owners - in the field of education and training as the school owner, will be subject to social insurance payment regimes.
"While waiting for the new law to be passed, business owners can participate in voluntary social insurance or family health insurance," said a representative of the Ho Chi Minh City Social Insurance.
Regularly update legal regulations
Also at the conference, businesses shared many difficulties related to land use change registration documents; granting work permits to foreign teachers; doing business in the field of extra teaching and learning; supporting the improvement of teacher qualifications at non-public facilities...
In response to these complaints, Director of the Department of Education and Training of Ho Chi Minh City Nguyen Van Hieu requested that investors regularly update legal documents related to the fields they are operating in.
"In the coming time, the Department of Management of Non-Public Educational Institutions will periodically organize meetings with units, update legal documents and new policies of ministries and branches to support units in the management and operation of educational institutions," said the Director of the Department of Education and Training of Ho Chi Minh City.
On the side of the Ho Chi Minh City People's Committee, Vice Chairman of the Ho Chi Minh City People's Committee Duong Anh Duc requested the Ho Chi Minh City Department of Education and Training to open more channels to receive information and provide regular feedback to businesses, and publicize information on the Ho Chi Minh City Department of Education and Training's Electronic Information Portal.
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| Vice Chairman of Ho Chi Minh City People's Committee Duong Anh Duc gave a speech at the dialogue conference. |
"I suggest that departments and branches listen to comments in a receptive spirit, share and guide businesses in solving difficulties, thereby contributing to improving the quality of the non-public education system, meeting the diverse learning needs of the people," said the Vice Chairman of the Ho Chi Minh City People's Committee.
At the same time, comrade Duong Anh Duc said that the city leaders will continue to recommend superior agencies to supplement and amend some inadequate regulations; at the same time, thoroughly implement the working spirit for departments and branches in the city to provide maximum support to businesses, not to be rigid in handling procedural documents.
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