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At the meeting |
Chairman Phan Van Mai made the statement while chairing yesterday’s meeting on the socio-economic situation in August and the first eight months of 2023 and deployed key tasks and solutions for September 2023.
Reporting the socio-economic situation, Director of the city’s Department of Planning and Investment Le Thi Huynh Mai assessed that in general, in August and the first eight months of the year, the southern metropolis' socio-economic situation achieved many positive results. For instance, the index of industrial production (IIP) in August increased by 6.6 percent while there were 25,523 newly established enterprises, up 11.3 percent and export turnover increased by 7.3 percent over the same period last year.
Moreover, 34.7 people used public passenger transport up 12.1 percent year on year.
In the first 8 months of the year, the index of industrial production (IIP) increased by 2.8 percent over the same period with four key industries’ IIP increasing by 6 percent. Total retail sales of consumer goods and services surged by 7.6 percent; total tourism revenue went up by 44 percent and the volume of public passenger transport moved up by 23.9 percent.
Approximately 113.72 million tons of goods were transported through seaports in the first 8 months of 2023, up 3.85 percent over the same period.
However, the city still has some weaknesses. Although tourism revenue and the number of international and domestic visitors in the first 8 months of the year increased, the revenue saw a year-on-year decrease of 1.2 percent in August. In August, the numbers of international and domestic visitors decreased 22 percent and 6 percent respectively.
Moreover, export turnover in the first 8 months of the year decreased by 15.3 percent over the same period. The number of newly established enterprises increased but registered capital decreased by 12.4 percent over the same period. Worse, roughly 22,387 enterprises temporarily suspended operations, up 28.3 percent while FDI attraction was about US$1.96 billion, down 27 percent over the same period. Plus, the disbursement of public investment capital reached VND19,133 billion (US$790,627,642), reaching only 28 percent of the assigned capital plan and failing to meet the disbursement progress according to regulations.
Addressing the meeting, Chairman Phan Van Mai said that the socio-economic meeting of Ho Chi Minh City in August 2023 was convened after the Resolution 98/2023/QH15 on piloting a number of specific mechanisms and policies for Ho Chi Minh City's development has taken effect for one month.
Mentioning the collection of revenue for the city’s state budget, Mr. Phan Van Mai said that the collected results so far have not met the set requirements. Departments and agencies must continue to implement solutions to nurture revenue sources, remove difficulties for businesses, and review collections of revenue and expenditure to avoid loss of revenue sources. He emphasized the enhancement of revenue sources from land, which both creates revenue for Ho Chi Minh City and removes difficulties for projects.
Recently, Ho Chi Minh City has implemented many things to concretize Resolution 98/2023/QH15. The Ho Chi Minh City People's Council has issued a resolution on allocating public investment capital for a sustainable poverty reduction program.
In addition, the People's Council of Ho Chi Minh City has allocated budget capital to implement the Ho Chi Minh City - Moc Bai expressway project and adjusted the medium-term public investment plan for 2021-2025.
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Deputy Director of the Ho Chi Minh City Department of Finance Phan Thi Hong |
In addition, Thu Duc City also decided to establish three new centers including the Social Security Center, the Technical Infrastructure Development Center, and the Trade Promotion and Investment Center under Resolution 98/2023/QH15.
According to the Chairman of the People's Committee of Ho Chi Minh City, the Standing Board of the Ho Chi Minh City Party Committee has issued Resolution 08 on tasks and a number of mechanisms for the development of Thu Duc City in the 2021-2025 period, with an orientation to 2030 with 26 task groups.
The city also issued Resolution No. 12 on the development orientation of Can Gio outlying district until 2030 with 41 task groups. He suggested that localities and departments focus on carrying out the groups of tasks set out by the Standing Committee of the City Party Committee in the two above-mentioned resolutions.
In addition, the Chairman of the People's Committee of Ho Chi Minh City said that the city is urgently implementing the city’s planning work.
Mr. Phan Van Mai stressed that although the results have improved, Ho Chi Minh City is still in the group of localities that are slow to disburse public investment capital. By August 25, Ho Chi Minh City had disbursed only VND19 trillion, reaching 28 percent of the assigned target. He said that the city is not only slow in disbursement at the stage of site clearance for projects but also in the overall disbursement work.
Upon disbursement problems in site clearance work, he requested localities and departments to follow each project so that they could help remove hiccups along the way. At the same time, 4 large project management boards including the Transportation Works Construction Investment Project Management Authority of HCMC (TCIP), the Management Authority for Urban Railways (MAUR), the Urban Infrastructure Construction Investment Projects Management Unit and the Management Board of Industrial and Civil Engineering Construction and Investment Projects of HCMC ought to be determined to carry out tasks for disbursing 70 percent of investment capital.
Chairman Phan Van Mai requested the Department of Education and Training of Ho Chi Minh City to research and propose a suitable enrollment plan for Ho Chi Minh City from next year by building 4,500 new classrooms to ensure enough seats for all children.
Deputy Director of the Ho Chi Minh City Department of Finance Phan Thi Hong revealed total state budget revenue in the first 8 months of the year was estimated at VND297,993 billion, reaching 63.45 percent of the year's estimate. She said that the city's budget revenue estimate in 2023 increased by 20 percent compared to 2022, but revenue only reached 93.24 percent over the same period. In order to fulfill the budget revenue target, the financial sector of Ho Chi Minh City must closely monitor the collection of revenue and expenditure while taking heed of combating tax evasion and commercial fraud.
In addition, the Department of Finance will coordinate with other departments and districts to quickly promote specific mechanisms in Resolution 98 to increase revenue. At the same time, review to increase revenue from land, speed up disbursement of public investment capital for early operation increase demand for economic growth as well as remove difficulties for enterprises strengthen tax management with the night economy, real estate transfer business and e-commerce.
