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| On April 1, the HCMC People's Committee organizes a meeting on the socio-economic situation in the first quarter and the tasks and solutions for the second quarter of 2023. (Photo: SGGP) |
Secretary of the Ho Chi Minh City Party Committee Nguyen Van Nen has requested that each field, sector, locality, and official review their efforts and solutions to determine their effectiveness. Based on this, solutions should be proposed to promote the city’s socio-economic development in the remaining quarters of 2023 and the following years.
On April 1, the HCMC People's Committee organized a meeting on the socio-economic situation in the first quarter and the tasks and solutions for the second quarter of 2023 under the theme "Promoting public investment and accelerating the implementation progress of key projects."
Mr. Nguyen Van Nen, Politburo Member, Secretary of the HCMC Party Committee, chaired the meeting with the attendance of Mr. Phan Van Mai, Member of the Party Central Committee, Permanent Deputy Secretary of the HCMC Party Committee, Chairman of the People's Committee of HCMC. Mr. Bui Xuan Cuong, Vice Chairman of the HCMC People's Committee, served as the conference moderator.
HCMC must look back to strive harder
Speaking at the meeting, Secretary of the HCMC Party Committee Nguyen Van Nen shared that in 2022, the city set targets and tasks to restore the socio-economic situation after the Covid-19 pandemic and take back what was lost due to the pandemic in 2021. At the end of 2022, the city achieved positive results and many bright spots.
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| Secretary of the HCMC Party Committee Nguyen Van Nen speaks at the meeting. (Photo: SGGP) |
In 2023, Ho Chi Minh City focuses on the theme of the year with a determination to improve the quality of public service activities, promote administrative reform, improve the investment environment, promote economic development activities, adapt, and seize every opportunity to overcome difficulties. The city also forecasts that there will be many difficulties and challenges in 2023, so the GRDP target is set lower than the previous year. However, this indicator decreased more deeply than expected in the first quarter of 2023.
The Secretary of the HCMC Party Committee requested the conference to focus on analyzing and assessing the causes and the health status of the city’s economy after the impact of Covid-19, whether it has truly recovered, and whether there is an appropriate treatment regimen. Specifically, each sector, department, locality, and official must review their efforts and solutions to determine their effectiveness. Based on that, solutions should be proposed to promote the city’s socio-economic development in the remaining quarters of 2023 and the following years.
Budget revenue reaches 26 percent of the annual estimate
In the report on the economic and social situation in Q1-2023, the Director of the HCMC Department of Planning and Investment, Ms. Le Thi Huynh Mai, stated that the city government has actively implemented directives from the Central Government, the City Party Committee, and the City People's Council with specific measures. Localities have also issued timely documents to implement tasks synchronously, leading to remarkable socio-economic achievements in Q1-2023.
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| Ms. Le Thi Huynh Mai, Director of the HCMC Department of Planning and Investment, speaks at the meeting. (Photo: SGGP) |
Specifically, the Q1-2023 GRDP growth is estimated at VND360.6 trillion, up 0.7 percent compared to the same period in 2022. Of the nine important service sectors, five have shown considerable growth, including wholesale and retail; finance, banking, and insurance; scientific and technological service activities; education and training; and accommodation and catering services. The remaining four sectors showed negative growth, including warehousing and transportation; information and communications; real estate; and healthcare and social assistance.
Total state budget revenue is estimated at VND124.7 trillion, reaching 26 percent of the annual estimate. Meanwhile, the total local budget expenditure is VND9.5 trillion, reaching 7 percent of the estimate and decreasing 8 percent compared to the same period last year.
By March 24, the city had disbursed VND951 billion, reaching 2 percent of the total allocated capital. It also held meetings to discuss the disbursement of public investment capital and put forward solutions to overcome limitations in order to ensure a disbursement rate of 95 percent in 2023, as required by the Prime Minister.
Ms. Le Thi Huynh Mai said that the HCMC’s economy was affected by the global downward trend and many factors. Specifically, the real estate and financial markets have faced many difficulties, with many banks having bad debts; local businesses have continued to cut jobs and encounter difficulties in terms of order and capital sources; the purchasing power of consumers has decreased sharply.
Making the real estate market healthy
Presenting 12 key solutions for Q2-2023, the Director of the Department of Planning and Investment stated that HCMC will focus on resolving incomplete tasks from Q1, resolutely not allowing Q1 and Q2's incomplete tasks to carry over to Q3.
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| The scene of the meeting. (Photo: SGGP) |
Additionally, the city will finalize the draft of three action programs by the Municipal Party Committee and the plan by the HCMC People's Committee to implement Resolution No.29 on promoting industrialization and modernization of the country; Resolution No.24 on socio-economic development and defense and security assurance in the Southeast region; and Resolution No.31 on the direction and tasks for HCMC's development. The city will also accelerate the implementation progress of 33 resolutions issued in the 8th session and 138 resolutions issued since the beginning of the current tenure of the HCMC People's Council with a focus on resolving voters' petitions.
In Q2-2023, HCMC will proactively work with central agencies on the draft resolution to replace Resolution No.54 to report to the Government to submit to the National Assembly for approval at the meeting session in May. At the same time, they will proactively develop a plan to implement the new resolution immediately after it is passed by the National Assembly.
The city will also implement an action plan to promote the disbursement of public investment capital in 2023. In which, the city proposes investment in the project to build a solid waste treatment plant and energy recovery at the Northwest Solid Waste Treatment Complex under the PPP method; accelerate the construction progress of the T3 passenger terminal, Metro line No.1, Xuyen Tam Canal project, An Phu intersection, the expansion of National Highway 50, and other ongoing projects.
In addition, HCMC will implement practices to make the real estate market transparent and healthy, have plans to handle slow projects, and ensure the rights of land users and investors.
TPHCM will organize a competition to select ideas for the underground construction planning of the existing city center and the new urban area of Thu Thiem; develop a coordination plan between the Department of Natural Resources and Environment and localities; review urban planning on both sides of the Belt Road No.3; continue to implement public restrooms in the central area, restart the city's parking lot projects; focus on gentrifying the city's downtown area, including Ben Thanh Market, Le Loi Street, Bach Dang Wharf, and September 23 Park.
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| Delegates participate in the meeting and contribute opinions to promote economic development for HCMC. (Photo: SGGP) |
In addition, TPHCM will continue to promote tourism activities; accelerate the development of science, technology, education, and training; ensure health care and social welfare; organize the reception of state visits and international guests with due protocol and courtesy; ensure national defense and security and social order and security.
Publicly and transparently disclosing all issues
Dr. Tran Du Lich, a member of the National Financial and Monetary Policy Advisory Council, evaluates that HCMC’s economic development has been greatly impacted by global and domestic situations. When the global and domestic economies are developing positively, HCMC can leverage these factors to gain advantages. Conversely, negative impacts can be expected during downturns. However, the growth rate of HCMC was only 0.7 percent in the first quarter of 2023, which is surprisingly low compared to the forecast.
Dr. Tran Du Lich believes that the objective reason for this poor result is that in the fourth quarter of 2022, unfortunately, the economy of HCMC and the country was affected by the global economic situation and the domestic real estate and financial market corrections. These two factors combined resulted in many difficulties for economic development, especially since HCMC was the most affected area in the country.
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| Dr. Tran Du Lich speaks at the meeting. (Photo: SGGP) |
By now, these two factors have weakened, and the risk of domestic bank collapse has passed, with interest rates and exchange rates being controlled. The negative impact on the city has decreased, but why was the growth rate so low?
According to Dr. Tran Du Lich, three driving forces to boost the economy include public investment, capital absorption, and domestic market development. However, in the first quarter of 2023, HCMC only disbursed 2 percent of its public investment capital, which can be seen as completely abandoning this tool. Secondly, the effort to remove institutional barriers to capital absorption has not been drastic enough, and it is necessary to be more transparent in calling for investment. Thirdly, the exploitation of the domestic market of the city has not been effective. Therefore, all three pillars to boost the economy, in other words, the medicine to revive the city, have not been used effectively.
Therefore, Dr. Tran Du Lich believes that the most important thing is that the city must be able to absorb capital and promote public and private investment. Resolutions No.24 on the development of the Southeast region and No.31 on the development of HCMC have affirmed the city's position in regional linkage. HCMC can completely revive its economy if it can solve the bottlenecks. In addition, HCMC must publicly disclose all issues. This is the key to creating confidence for businesses. When businesses have trust, the city will be able to develop.
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| At the conference (Photo: SGGP) |
HCMC takes drastic actions for production and business development
Speaking at the conference, Chairman of the municipal People’s Committee Phan Van Mai said that the People's Committee of Ho Chi Minh City is determined to take drastic actions with the aim at removing obstacles for people and enterprises to promote production and business development.
“Improving the investment environment" is part of the year’s theme of the city over the recent three years. It is regarded as one of the breakthrough solutions to promote the city's development.
However, this content has not been fully and effectively implemented as expected due to many objective causes, such as the Covid-19 pandemic, complicated global economic fluctuations, fuel price increase, regular market operation and supply chain disruptions, and interest rate rise.
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| Chairman of the HCMC People’s Committee Phan Van Mai speaks at the meeting. (Photo: SGGP) |
In 2020 and 2021, HCMC’s provincial competitiveness index (PCI) ranked 14th, keeping its rank from the previous year but bringing a fruitful result as expected.
In the Vietnam Provincial Governance and Public Administration Performance Index (PAPI) in 2021, HCMC was among the 15 worst performers with the lowest marks that decreased compared to 2020.
In 2021, the factors of “accountability to the public” and “public administrative procedures” saw a sharp decline.
HCMC needs promptly to discover the root cause of problems to identify appropriate solutions, such as shortening waiting times for public investment procedures, proposing regulatory responsibility of agencies in charge and investors for each specific project group, completing site clearance compensation, controlling corruption in the public sector, monitoring online public services, improving quality of cadres, civil servants and public employees, reforming administrative procedures, improving the public service environment, raising salary levels for cadres, civil servants and public employees, enhancing responsibility for “accountability to the public”.
The Government has launched resolutions to create favorable conditions for the city’s development, such as Politburo’s Resolution 31-NQ/TW on orientations and tasks for the development of HCMC by 2030, with a vision to 2045, and the upcoming new resolution to replace resolution 54/2017 of the National Assembly on piloting specific mechanisms and policies for the development of the southern metropolis. However, HCMC needs promptly to take drastic measures to solve existing problems to take advantage of these resolutions.
