Public investment capital disbursement remains slow

Hanoi (VNA) – Ministries, sectors and localities have together disbursed over 83 trillion VND (3.73 billion USD) of public investment capital so far this year, completing 33.14 percent of the disbursement plan in 2016, heard a meeting in Hanoi on June 21.

According to Minister of Planning and Investment Nguyen Chi Dung, the disbursement in public investment projects in the first months of the year has been slow.

Almost capital sources planned for national target programmes in the first five months of the year were not disbursed because these have not been approved officially.

Disbursement of capital raised via Government bond sales in the period also remained low compared to the set plan, with around 6.081 trillion VND (273.6 million USD) spent, equivalent to only 15.42 percent of the yearly plan.

The Ministry of Transport, the Mekong Delta province of Kien Giang and Hanoi were said to be lagged behind in the work, with respective disbursement rates of 6.2 percent, 4 percent and 3 percent.

Minister Dung attributed the situations to several main reasons, including slow submission of capital plans by several ministries, sectors and localities, and uncompleted and incompatible documents guiding assessment and approval of projects.

Difficulties in land clearance, and weak competence of contractors were also reasons behind the situations, Dung said.

At the meeting, representatives from ministries and sector clarified information related to the progress of disbursement, while committing to completing early guidance documents, contributing to accelerating the disbursement in the coming time.

Deputy Prime Minister Vuong Dinh Hue, who chaired the meeting, urged ministries, sectors and localities to quicken capital disbursement, in order to ensure job generation for the people and the nation’s economic growth.

He asked the Ministries of Planning and Investment, and Finance to examine and revise documents guiding the implementation of projects, and inspect the quality of public investment projects, towards promoting the role of projects for the nation’s socio-economic growth.-VNA