Cure “have money but can’t spend it”

21/63 localities have disbursement rate below 20%

In 2022, the task is very heavy when the amount of capital to be disbursed is very large, including the capital of the socio-economic recovery program. “Having money but can’t spend it” is what the National Assembly deputies said about the slow disbursement of public investment capital in the economic and social discussion session.

Over the past time, the Prime Minister has continuously directed and established 6 working groups in ministries, branches and localities to promptly grasp, why has this important capital source not been disbursed? Why is progress slow? Many major obstacles hindering disbursement were pointed out.

As in the embankment project on the left side of Yen river, Cao Bang city with a total investment of 120 billion VND. After nearly a year of construction, many main items have not been completed. The rainy season comes, making the project difficult to deploy, the risk of delay is increasingly present.

This is also the common situation of many projects, causing Cao Bang province to disburse less than 7% of the total allocated public investment capital of more than 3,300 billion VND.

“We determine the main reason is subjective, but we have a part of more than 900 billion VND for the expressway project, but so far the project has not had an approved investment policy and has not been approved for the project. “, said Mr. Hoang Xuan Anh – Chairman of the People’s Committee of Cao Bang province.

In addition to the inherent reasons such as slow site clearance, limited investment preparation and project implementation, the increase in prices of many building materials and input materials in the first five months of the year also slowed down disbursement progress. However, the most important issue still lies in the role of the heads of localities.

According to the Ministry of Finance, the disbursement rate of public investment capital in the first 5 months of the year only reached 22.37% of the plan assigned by the Prime Minister. There are still 41 ministries and 21 localities with disbursement rate below 20%. In which, 5 ministries have not yet disbursed this year’s capital plan.

Ho Chi Minh City People’s Committee said that by the end of last week, the disbursement rate of public investment capital of this economic locomotive had reached VND 4,300 billion out of the total allocated capital this year of VND 45,000 billion, equivalent to 13.5%. This figure is lower than the overall disbursement rate of the whole country, which is more than 22%. This is worrisome as this will affect the city’s GRDP growth.

Why “have money but can’t spend it”?

“The slow disbursement of public investment capital is an inherent problem, stemming from many reasons, but the main source of funding is both subjective and objective”, said Mr. Can Van Luc – Member of the Financial Policy Advisory Council, Currency National Rate.

According to Mr. Luc, objectively, the epidemic has been complicated in recent times and we have only reopened since February 15. Next, the price of raw materials increased sharply by 40-50%, which changed the estimation stage of many projects, and the approval took a lot of time. The next objective reason is to follow the processes and procedures in the Law on Public Investment, Law on Bidding, Law on Construction… which are still relatively complicated.

Regarding the subjective budget, according to Mr. Luc, the slow disbursement of public investment stemming from the responsibility of the head is not drastic and determined… Besides, the coordination between ministries, branches and localities is still not match, especially in inter-provincial and inter-regional projects. In addition, the psychology of fear and risk aversion; Investor capacity is not good…

The role of the head is considered very important in disbursing public investment capital (Artwork).

On June 2, at a discussion session on approving the state budget settlement in 2020 and practicing thrift and anti-waste in 2021, Minister of Planning and Investment Nguyen Chi Dung pointed out a number of problems in slow disbursement of public investment capital.

Firstly, the progress and quality of the formulation, appraisal, approval and assignment of investment capital plans, the selection of projects to build the portfolio and prepare the investment portfolio and investment preparation are still inadequate. , the efficiency is not high.

Secondly, the observance of legal provisions related to public investment faces many difficulties due to the lack of uniformity of the legal system and the awkward implementation of regulations.

“The role of the head has not been promoted, discipline and discipline are not strict, inspection and examination work is still limited, the handling of violations is slow in the management and use of public investment. ..”, Mr. Dung added about the reasons for the slow disbursement of public investment.

Remove bottlenecks in disbursement of public investment capital

Regarding the solution to accelerate the disbursement of public investment capital, according to Mr. Can Van Luc, firstly, it is necessary to assign the responsibilities of the leaders more clearly.

Next, the working group model should be implemented, because this will help increase the ability to coordinate many departments, instead of “dispatching out, dispatching back” which can take up to several months.

Along with that, according to Mr. Luc, must be determined to review and improve mechanisms, policies, processes and procedures, including investment, construction, and bidding at home and abroad. Next, it is necessary to pay great attention to the capacity of the investor; focus on preparing project documents…

“The stage of planning to propose public investment in a year must be associated with the name of a list of specific projects. At the same time, check the absorption capacity of the project to what extent, ensuring efficiency, quality, and avoiding waste. “, suggested Mr. Luc.

In 2022, the country’s public investment capital is over 650,000 billion VND

In 2022, the country’s public investment capital is over 650,000 billion VND, an increase of about 200,000 billion VND compared to previous years. Disbursing this amount of capital is a huge challenge because nearly half a year, local ministries and branches disbursed… over 20%. If this capital is fully disbursed to works and projects, it will create about 1.7 percentage points of GDP growth of the whole country and the country will have more works and infrastructure. Therefore, if the disbursement of public investment cannot be promoted, the country and the economy will suffer double losses.

Another worrying thing is that a 30% increase in gasoline prices will affect all input materials prices of the construction industry. Therefore, contractors have the mentality of doing in moderation… because the faster they do, the more losses they will incur. Therefore, if there is no drastic solution, the disbursement rate of public investment capital this year will be difficult to achieve the target.

* Invite readers to watch the programs broadcast by Vietnam Television on TV Online and VTVGo!