The design plan of the viaducts over the valley of Dong Dang - Tra Linh Expressway Project

In the current context, promoting socialization to deploy the construction of expressway works under the PPP method is the most optimal approach. With an enormous work amount of about 3.800km of expressways to be completed in less than next 10 years, there are many points of view that the State must have a "linkage mechanism" from central agencies to localities, from localities to businesses and from businesses to all people to complete the target of 5.000km by 2030.

It is necessary to put aside the current inadequacies in terms of policies, credit, etc. in order to achieve the common goal of completing the national expressway network.

The design plan of Than Mountain Tunnel

Clearing the “regulatory” barrier

At the latest Government meeting on expressways, the Prime Minister Mr. Pham Minh Chinh emphasized the role, responsibility and initiative of localities through his unequivocal point of view: “If any locality that project is located, the local authority plays the role as the competent state agency of the project. Localities have to take care of the budget and land clearance for it projects”. In order for the Prime Minister's direction to be highly effective, mechanisms and policies need to be adjusted to become more open.

Actually, a number of projects that have been assigned to local authorities as the competent state agencies in the pre-feasibility (PreFS) study stage or even approved for investment policies have been delayed by regulations. For example, the projects such as Dong Dang - Tra Linh Expressway connecting Lang Son with Cao Bang and Tan Phu - Bao Loc Expressway connecting Dong Nai with Lam Dong were still stuck by regulations although Cao Bang and Lam Dong are very determined and ready to invest capital to build them soon.

Currently, according to Article 6 of the PPP Law, any expressway project decided investment policy by the Prime Minister has establish an interdisciplinary appraisal council to appraise the PreFS report and the feasibility (FS) report. The council is in charge of appraising two steps, one is for the Prime Minister to approve the investment policy, another is for the local authority approve the FS report.

Such FS report appraisal process leads to many lengthy administrative procedures. At the conference on mechanisms and policies concerning expressway investment under PPP method recently held by the Ministry of Planning and Investment to listen to the frank opinions of the businesses investing in this field, including opinions of investors about the FS report approval competence. Particularly, regarding the projects having the decision to approve investment policies before the PPP law came into effect, or regarding other projects appraised by the Interdisciplinary Appraisal Council for investment policies to submit to the Prime Minister for approval, their step of approving the FS reports should be assigned to the local authorities for the appraisal and approval.

The PPP Law stipulates that any PPP project proposed by an investor have not to be the same as PPP projects being organized to prepare the preFS report by a competent authority or having been approved for another investor to prepare the preFS report.

Investors said that current expressway projects have been preliminary researched by the Ministry of Transport. The research process is to evaluate to choose the optimal method of investment. Many of them have been researched but have not been approved because there is no capital to determine investment under public or PPP method.

Investors proposing new projects have faced dificulties steming from unclear regulations mentioned above. Those regulations could be more open to allow investors to propose more projects to find more suitable and economically efficient method.

The tunnel project through the mountain takes the image of Ban Gioc Waterfall

Changing capital structure

A number of component projects of the North-South Expressway in the East in the period from 2016 to 2020, although with more than 50% of the capital from the State budget and less than 15 years of the payback period, cannot attracted any investors.

On the contrary, the projects needing to be implemented in the near future are all difficult projects with the payback period lasting more than 20 years. However, those projects are attractive to investors because they see the great determination of the local authority in allocating capital to turn the aspirations of local people into reality.

Regarding the Dong Dang - Tra Linh Expressway Project, Cao Bang Provincial Party Committee established the Project Steering Committee with the participation of many local leaders. Experts and capable investors were also invited to participate in it to solve Cao Bang - going problem.

The total construction investment amount of 47 trillion VND has been reduced to 23 billion VND by reducing 19 km in the route length by using technology to build tunnels through mountains and viaducts through the valley.

The project has been also phased in investment so that the total construction investment amount is 13.700 billion VND. Although the project’s capital plan has been reduced twice, the project is still facing difficulties due to low traffic volume and the proportion of State budget capital involved in the project not exceeding 50% according to the PPP law.

The design model of the large bridge over the river

On May 28, the Minister of Planning and Investment Mr. Nguyen Chi Dung and Secretary of Cao Bang Provincial Party Committee Mr. Lai Xuan Mon organized a field trip. The Minister of Planning and Investment asked to continue researching to reduce the project’s capital plan, orienting to connect the border gate areas and creating highlights through architectural works expressing Cao Bang culture such as: tunnels through the mountains with the image of Ban Gioc Waterfall, viaducts through the valley more than 100m high with the image of the ethnic musical instrument, traffic intersections with the image of victory in Dong Khe, etc.

According to Mr. Lai Xuan Mon, the "three letters P" proposed by Deo Ca Group is simple and suitable for the current context. However, the major thing is how to do it in practice. Those letters P, including "P – the State budget capital", "P – the investor equity" and "P - the mobilized capital". The first letter P represents the State budget capital, which shows the political determination of local leaders when using local budget for land clearance and partial support of the construction and using the central budget to participate in support of the project construction. The second one represents the investor equity, which is the choice of investors with experience, financial capacity and management capacity. The third one represents the mobilized capital, which is the capital raising from other investors in many fields. such as real estate, urban industry, hi-tech agriculture, services, logistics, etc., localities are in charge of participating in the mobilizing it.

By QUANG THANH

Source:https://nhandan.vn/thong-tin-doanh-nghiep/can-co-che-lien-thong-tao-ra-gia-tri-xa-hoi-de-hoan-thanh-5-000km-duong-cao-toc-649623/