Vietnam Localities Yet Submit Reports on FDI Projects

Many Vietnamese cities and provinces have not yet submitted reports on foreign direct investment (FDI) projects on regardless of the Ministry of Planning and Investment (MPI)’s requirement prior Sept 10.

 

The situation is blamed for local authorities’ effort to seek proposals from the investors to find the best solution for the projects, instead of revoking them.

 

Investors of various sluggish projects, including US$4.15 billion Dragon Beach invested by the U.S.’s Tano Capital LLC and Global C&D Inc and a US$1.68 billion creative city by Galileo Investment Group Vietnam are urged to inform the implementation pace this month, a MPI anonymous official said.

 

He affirmed that the Southeast Asian country is determined to recall licenses of these projects if their investors failed to make final decisions.

 

Earlier, the MPI asked localities to submit reports on any FDI projects worth over US$1 billion each, urban area project covering more than five hectares, realty project of over 50ha and several ones in a move to raise quality of the FDI inflow.

 

The ministry said Vietnam now has 100 mammoth projects, including 16 ones having capital of US$1 billion each and a US$7.87-billion project invested by Taiwan’s Formosa group being the largest.

 

It, however, noted that many of these US$1-billion projects are still on paper, just virtual or face high risk of being withdrawn due to their sluggish implementation. 

 

Foreign investors are estimated to disburse US$47 billion in FDI in Vietnam between 2001 and 2009, accounting for just one-third of the country’s total registered FDI of US$124 billion during the period.

 

To control the quality of FDI projects, locality should be more careful in licensing as the decentralization policy is considered the major cause of massive but low-quality FDI inflow in Vietnam. (Investment)