Nguyen Ngoc Long, deputy chairman of the Viet Nam Bridge and Road Science and Technology Association, speaks to the newspaper Tuoi Tre (Youth) about land clearance problems.
What are the major consequences of slow land clearance in transport projects?
There are quite a lot. However, here, I just want to mention the five major ones.
Firstly, it reduces a project’s socio-economic outcomes. One project I know for example, was delayed for three years – double the amount of time that had been projected. Just imagine how much money three years of delays would cost?
Secondly, delays in land clearance in the current context of quickly changing economic circumstances and fluctuations in the price of rice, as well as the government’s policies, always adds to a projects costs. On average, delays in land clearance often results in a project costing 150 per cent more, sometimes 200 per cent. A case in point is the Thanh Xuan interchange, on Ha Noi’s ring road No 3. The three-year delay in land clearance tripled the project’s cost – from VND 300 billion ($14.1 million) to VND1,000 billion ($47 million).
Thirdly, due to the delay in land clearance, both the projects owner and the contractor were forced to use even slower techniques.
But you know, when building roads, all the stages must follow certain standard procedures. However, when the soil foundations are found to be weak, they require special treatment and this technique was not appropriate.
Fourthly, road users complain about the dirty and dangerous roads.
And finally, the delays demonstrate the weaknesses of the policies and how they are carried out. As a result, this makes people loose confidence in the government and leads to many outstanding petitions and accusations.
In major road and bridge projects, the local governments are in charge of land clearance. But when there are delays in land clearance, many projects are orphans. In these cases who has to take responsibility?
A road or bridge project is often divided into several sub-projects and local government is in charge of clearing the land. That means they have to take full responsibility for the land clearance. They have to bear the consequences of the delays in land clearance.
What is hard about clearing the land and what are the solutions?
Normally, in any project that requires the land being cleared, the first thing they do is to work out a plan in line with the land compensation code. But, from the day the project is approved to the day it actually begins often takes several years. During this time, land prices have usually risen considerably.
This is the main reason behind the petitions and accusations in many places around the country.
It is the same when building resettlement houses for people who have their land allocated for public projects.
Do you agree that the government should clearly define which agency takes responsibility for what?
The Government has stated clearly that the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment (MONRE) will act as policy advisor to the government while the Ministry of Transport and others who have projects in the pipeline will be the project management and administration agencies. The local government is responsible for clearing the land.
The Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Planning and Investment have to ensure funding for these projects, so in other words, who does what, is already clearly defined in the governments legislation.
In this case, MONRE is supposed to make sure that the other ministries and local governments across the country regular report back to the government. — VNS
Đăng ký: VietNam News