Drastic measures needed to accelerate disbursement of foreign-funded public investment

Workers at the site of a public-invested project in Yên Bái Province. The disbursement rate of foreign-funded public investment was disappointing, at 39.06 per cent in the first 11 months of this year, equivalent to VNĐ3.287 trillion (US$129.3 million). — VNA/VNS PHoto Phạm Hậu

HÀ NỘI - Drastic measures are needed to remove blocks and accelerate the disbursement of foreign-funded public investment in the remaining months of this year, as the rate remains far below the target of 95 per cent, according to the Ministry of Finance.

The ministry’s report, revealed at a conference to discuss solutions to speed up the foreign-funded public investment on Tuesday, showed that the disbursement rate was disappointing, at 39.06 per cent in the first 11 months of this year, equivalent to VNĐ3.287 trillion (US$129.3 million), lower than the rate of 53.16 per cent recorded in the same period last year.

Only two out of ten ministries and agencies reported the disbursement rate of more than 50 per cent which were the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment (87.76 per cent) and the Ministry of Transport (58.35 per cent).

Four ministries have yet to disburse any foreign-funded public investment to date, including the Ministry of Education and Training, the Ministry of Construction, the Ministry of Labour, Invalids and Social Affairs and the Ministry of Health.

“The disappointing disbursement poses significant challenges to the disbursement rate goal of at least 95 per cent year set by the Government,” Deputy Director of the ministry’s Department of Debt Management and External Finance Hoàng Hải said, adding that drastic efforts are needed to remove bottlenecks in term of administrative procedures and mechanisms to accelerate the disbursement.

Participants at the conference pointed out major causes which resulted in stagnation in the disbursement of public investment.

A representative from the Ministry of Education and Training, which has two projects using foreign-funded public investment worth a total of VNĐ629 billion said that many projects were facing difficulties in site clearance and complicated procedures in bidding and design evaluation. Some projects must adjust the investment policies several times, requiring adjustments in lending agreements and delays in approval and implementation.

Deputy Director of the ministry’s Department of State Budget, Nguyễn Minh Tân, said that failure in disbursing public investment was a waste, given the context that the capital demand for investment and development is huge.

Tân asked ministries and agencies which were slow in disbursing public investment to raise solutions to achieve the highest disbursement results while developing efficient capital plans for 2025.

He stressed that the Ministry of Planning and Investment needed to enhance discipline for capital allocation.

While it would be difficult to achieve the disbursement rate of 95 per cent, Hải said that relevant ministries and agencies must enhance coordination to complete procedures and implement projects which are funded from foreign sources with efficiency.

Accountability must be enhanced to achieve the best result.

The focus should be on improving supervision of the implementation progress, promptly tackling bottlenecks in site clearance, bidding procedures and adjustments of investment policies.

The amended Law on Public Investment which was passed at the eighth meeting of the 15th National Assembly, together with other laws were expected to create breakthroughs in institution to accelerate the efficient use of public investment, a deputy minister of Planning and Investment said recently.

The Ministry of Finance’s statistics showed that overall VNĐ410.95 trillion in public investment was disbursed in January – November, or 64.43 per cent of the Government’s plan.