Keeping Good Image of Soc Trang in the Eyes of Investors

With the steely determination of the whole political system of the province to turn local potential into real economic gains, Soc Trang province’s investment attraction efforts have produced remarkable outcomes and turned the “land of pagodas of Vietnam” into an open, friendly and appealing attraction to domestic and foreign investors. Following is the interview of Vietnam Business Forum Magazine with Mr. Vo Chi Cong, Director of the Department of Planning and Investment. Cong Luan reports.

Could you please tell more details about good results in investment attraction in Soc Trang province?

In the past time, the Provincial Party Committee and the Provincial People’s Committee of Soc Trang have focused on directing investment promotion to actively approach investors, and increasing investment support by delivering consultancy and information and meeting with investors and businesses. In 2018, the province successfully organized the Conference on Investment Promotion and Startup Launch, and attracted 47 projects with VND122,880 billion of investment capital, of which VND22,646 billion was approved for investment in principle and VND100,234 billion was committed on paper. At the conference, the Provincial People’s Committee awarded investment licenses and pledges to 25 projects with VND40,315 billion.

After the successful meeting, all-tier agencies continued to promote achieved results and actively coordinated with each other to seek investors. Many big domestic and foreign investors arrived in the province to explore the business climate and start their business. Since then, the province has granted investment licenses to 57 projects with a total investment of VND61,811 billion.

Particularly, in 2019, Soc Trang province granted investment decisions to 17 projects with a total registered capital of VND6,925 billion, including five wind power projects, one infrastructure investment project for an industrial cluster, one hospital project, one high-speed train project, and one high-tech clean shrimp project for export.

To meet land demands of project investors, land compensation and site clearance plays an extremely important role. So, how has Soc Trang province dealt with this?

Soc Trang province pays special attention to land compensation and clearance in order to best meet land demands for investment projects from enterprises and investors. Specifically, we have built a website on land to help investors, businesses and citizens to access local land information in a timely and quick manner, thus improving transparency and access to information and PCI improvement.

The province also completed urban plans, detailed plans and land use plans for the 2015-2020 period for districts, towns and cities, submitted them to competent authorities for approval, announced them in full on websites, and actively guided enterprises to study and formulate production and business investment projects to access land resources. It also sped up land-use right certification for organizations and reduced administrative and compliance costs in this work, which was considered an important measure to ease hardships for businesses. Soc Trang also reviewed, completed and publicly announced land-use plans to effectively use land resources; ensured compliance with master socioeconomic development plans, gave priority to land for planned projects to facilitate investors to compensate land and clear business ground; reviewed regulations on land compensation and ground clearance; reviewed administrative procedures and shortened settlement time.

For each key project calling for investment, the Provincial People’s Committee assigned a provincial department/agency or a district-level People's Committee to act as a focal point to closely work with land clearance agencies to handle land allocation or land lease procedures to investors. Every month, the Provincial People’s Committee chairs meetings with relevant units to check the project progress and promptly remove emerging difficulties for investors. It also established a working group to coordinate investment procedures to directly advise the Provincial People’s Committee to assist investors to deal with hardships and obstacles when carrying out investment procedures.

As a result, investors are more satisfied when they invest in Soc Trang. This was reflected in its Provincial Competitiveness Index (PCI) rankings in 2018. The land access index of Soc Trang province ranked 5th out of 63 provinces and cities nationwide.

With the high determination of the entire political system, the image of a friendly, open, potential Soc Trang has become increasingly reliable and attractive to domestic and international investors. So, how does the province keep and boost this fine image?

In order to further beautify the image of Soc Trang in the eyes of investors, in the coming time, we will focus on carrying out central investment support policies and local support policies. Specifically, we will arrange a part of the budget to implement investment encouragement and attraction policies as per Resolution 07/NQ-HDND of the Provincial People’s Council; effectively execute policies to encourage enterprises to invest in rural agriculture in the spirit of Decree 57/2017/ND-CP; improve the investor support quality such as preparing all necessary conditions (planning and land among other things) and speeding up procedural settlement for projects on the investment priority list. We will proactively approach potential investors to convince them to invest in the province.

The province will also further strengthen meetings and dialogues with businesses to timely capture and solve their difficulties and problems as well as respond to recommendations on production, business and project execution from enterprises and investors. Soc Trang will effectively implement tasks and solutions according to Government Resolution 02/NQ-CP dated January 1, 2020; base on central guidance to monitor and improve the Provincial Competitiveness Index (PCI); deploy the Department and District Competitiveness Index (DDCI) for provincial agencies and district authorities in the province in the period in 2020-2021 in order to create competition among units in performing their business and investor support duties. It will review and complete the procedures and prepare a full legal basis to announce and call for key projects with positive impacts on local socioeconomic development to enable investors to accelerate their project progress. It will strengthen coordination of provincial departments and district authorities in solving procedures of registering and implementing investment projects to improve investors support quality and speed up investment project registration and deployment.

Soc Trang province sincerely invites and willingly welcomes investors and pledges to create favorable conditions for them to explore, make business investment, and utilize local potential and strengths in the spirit of the motto "Soc Trang - Your opportunity".

 Thank you very much!

Source: Vietnam Business Forum