Quang Binh always Sides with Investors

Quang Binh features diverse natural conditions, likened to Vietnam's miniature. The province has forests, the sea, plains and all traffic modes of roadway, railway, waterway and airway. Quang Binh people are hardworking, honest, intelligent and compassionate. Despite having rich potential for socioeconomic development, Quang Binh is still a poor province. To be prosperous and beautiful, it must be invested. Quang Binh is considered a good business destination in Vietnam, with the Provincial Governance and Public Administration Performance Index (PAPI) rising year after year to secure top rankings in the country. The time to solve administrative procedures is quick, well-ordered and satisfactory to investors.

Following the success of its investment promotion conferences since 2014, the Provincial People’s Committee continued to cooperate with the Bank for Investment and Development of Vietnam (BIDV) to hold the Quang Binh Investment Promotion Conference 2018 scheduled for late July 2018. This is the fifth year Quang Binh province hosts the investment promotion conference to woo domestic and foreign organisations, enterprises and investors. This is also an opportunity to meet and exchange between the government and businesses in Quang Binh with investors to find opportunities of investment and business cooperation to work out approaches and solutions to unlock local potential and strengths.

The Quang Binh Investment Promotion Conference 2018, themed “Cooperation and Sustainable Development”, will focus on four main areas: tourism, renewable energy, high-tech agriculture, and sustainable development. This edition of conference has shifted to focus on substantiality and selectivity, only call for high-tech, environment-friendly projects that create jobs for local people, especially tourism, service, high-tech, renewable energy and green agricultural projects. Quang Binh rejects environment-polluting projects notwithstanding slight impacts. Licensed and pending projects are all related to high tech like wind power and solar power.

Quang Binh Investment Promotion Conference 2018 is also a chance to introduce the Master Plan for Quang Binh Socioeconomic Development to 2030, with a vision to 2050. How do you think of development highlights in the years to come?

With respect to the Master Plan for Quang Binh Socioeconomic Development to 2030 and further to 2050, Quang Binh defined tourism development as a key economic sector. This judicious policy was adopted by the 16th Party Congress of the Standing Board of the Provincial Party Committee and the Provincial People’s Committee. On January 16, 2017, the Politburo issued Resolution 08-NQ/TW defining that tourism will be developed to be a key economic sector. On potentiality, the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism affirmed that Quang Binh province has great tourism potential. Objectively speaking, Quang Binh ranked top by tourism potential in the country.

In recent years, Quang Binh province has expressed its resolve to improve the investment and business environment and to make great efforts to siding with businesses and investors. How have those resolutions and efforts been illustrated?

Over the past time, the Provincial People’s Committee drastically directed investment attraction, focused on administrative reform to give a facelift to the investment and business climate and form an attractive, open and transparent investment environment for investors.

Quang Binh is seen as a good place to do business in the country. Given that the Provincial Competitiveness Index (PCI) has constantly looked up, more and more domestic and foreign investors and economic groups are present in the province.

The province has consistently carried out solutions like organising many investment promotion events, fostering images, potential and investment opportunities in Vietnam and the world, opening government-investor meetings and dialogues, formulating and approving the list of projects seeking investment capital; reviewing and adjusting master plans for socioeconomic development in districts and cities as well as urban development plans to 2020. Efforts to mobilise, allocate and utilise resources publicly and transparently are also frequently focused by the province.

Quang Binh province is also taking advantage of central funds, official development assistance (ODA) funds and preferential loans from international donors to carry out key projects and gradually synchronise social and economic infrastructure systems for economic restructuring.

In addition, the province regularly researches, complements and perfects investment support policies for enterprises. Based on the governmental framework for investment incentives, the province has exempted land rent, water surface rent, corporate income tax, export and import duty when the highest preferential rates in the framework are applied. Typically, on July 18, 2017, the Provincial People's Council issued Resolution 19/2017/NQ-HDND on regulations on a number of preferential policies and investment supports in the province (tax and land incentives, compensation and ground clearance supports, infrastructure construction supports, technical assistances outside project locations and labour training funds); investment assistances for companies investing in tourist accommodation facilities and eateries; supports for opening new flight routes; and supports for innovative startups. As for important projects that have strong impacts on local socioeconomic development, the province will adopt its own preferential policies based on decisions of the Provincial People’s Committee.

How has the operation of the Quang Binh Public Administration Centre from January 17, 2018, promoted public administration reform and improved the local investment and business environment?

With the goal of “Public administration reform - Development motivation, taking the satisfaction of organisations and individuals as a measure of service quality and performance,” the operation of the Quang Binh Public Administration Centre made breakthroughs in reforming administrative procedures and modernising the administration to woo more investors to foster the local socioeconomic development.

Previously, to solve a procedure, organisations, individuals and enterprises often had to go back and forth to carry out many steps, thus easily resulting in congestions and delays in record appraisal and settlement. When it went into operation on January 1, 2018, the Quang Binh Public Administration Centre became a focal point for provincial departments and agencies to receive and settle administrative procedures to enhance the effectiveness and efficiency of administrative procedure settlement by State agencies while raising the interconnectivity of administrative procedures, ensuring a quick, open and transparent settlement and reducing compliance costs among others. These altogether will help improve the quality of public services, build a government in action and boosting the satisfaction of business and people in the province.

On the occasion of the Quang Binh Investment Promotion Conference 2018, do you want to convey any message or commitment of the provincial government to partners and investors?