To make Con Cuong the regional center of western Nghe An province.
To achieve the goal of "Building and developing Con Cuong into a type 4 urban area with an ecological and tourism orientation," as the center of the western region of Nghe An province, Con Cuong district is striving to attract investors to the locality.
Regarding this issue, Nghe An Newspaper had an interview with Mr. Lo Van Thao - Deputy Secretary of the District Party Committee and Chairman of the District People's Committee.
PV:For mountainous districts, attracting investment is of particular importance to promoting socio-economic development. How has Con Cuong district defined its investment attraction strategy? What advantages does the district currently possess to implement this task?
Mr. Lo Van Thao:In the context of economic restructuring and cuts in public investment, attracting non-budgetary investment capital plays a crucial role in supplementing resources for achieving economic development goals. Con Cuong District clearly defines its policy of selectively attracting non-budgetary investment projects, ensuring environmental criteria, suitability for an ecological urban area, contributing to the district's budget revenue, addressing social welfare issues, utilizing advanced technology, and creating high added value.
Con Cuong District possesses several advantages for development, including: its location at the midpoint of National Highway 7A, serving as an important gateway to the southwestern region of Nghe An province and identified as an economic growth pole, facilitating the expansion of economic relations and trade. The district also has a relatively well-developed transportation infrastructure.
As a border district, Con Cuong holds a strategically important position in terms of national defense and security, receiving significant investment and support from the Party and Government. Located within the Western Nghe An Biosphere Reserve, the district boasts numerous scenic spots, historical and revolutionary relics, and a long-standing cultural and historical tradition... all of which provide favorable conditions for tourism development, especially ecotourism and resort tourism.
Forest resources are a potential strength of Con Cuong district. The large forested area (159,755 hectares) is favorable for developing the forest economy, attracting investment projects in forestry, planting raw material forests and medicinal plants, and livestock farming. In addition, Con Cuong district possesses abundant land resources suitable for many types of crops, facilitating agricultural diversification, including the cultivation of high-value fruit trees and various raw material crops. This is a significant advantage for the development of the processing industry in Con Cuong district.
Besides its advantages, Con Cuong district also faces limitations such as long distances for goods transportation, a shortage of large land areas, and a temporary shortage of highly skilled labor. To overcome these limitations, the district is striving to invest in improving transportation infrastructure; implementing early education streaming; promoting vocational training for workers; building a civilized and modern workforce; disseminating and educating on the law; ensuring good security and order; and reforming administrative procedures.
PV:To effectively leverage its advantages and create favorable conditions for businesses and the locality to develop together, what are the priority areas for attracting investment in Con Cuong district?
Mr. Lo Van Thao:Based on a clear understanding of its strengths, weaknesses, and development policies, Con Cuong district has selected several priority areas to attract investment.
The first,Priority will be given to developing the service sector and ecotourism. Specifically, focus will be placed on developing service industries with competitive advantages such as trade, tourism, transportation, banking, insurance, postal services, telecommunications, information technology, healthcare, culture, vocational training, and other forms of public services.
In tourism, the district focuses on attracting investors in ecotourism and cultural tourism. The main focus is on developing ecotourism in Pu Mat National Park and Pu Huong Nature Reserve; building ecotourism resorts in Pha Lai, Co Phat village (Mon Son commune), Tra Lan citadel (Bong Khe commune), Ma Nhai stele (Chi Khe commune), Khe Kem waterfall (Luc Da commune), Nang Man cave and Moc stream (Yen Khe commune).
Developing a system of hotels and restaurants ranked according to "star" criteria, entertainment centers; building service facilities along the Lai Ferry - Khe Khang route and along the Khe Kem waterfall route; upgrading the animal and plant gene museum at the Pu Mat National Park Center; developing key tourism programs, tours, and routes in the area that connect with tourism routes of the province and Laos and Thailand.
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Developing ecotourism in conjunction with community tourism, cultural, historical, and spiritual tourism destinations; building community tourism villages linked to agro-tourism experiences and resort tourism; developing traditional crafts to create attractive tourism products to serve tourists.
Monday,In the agricultural sector, Con Cuong district focuses on attracting businesses to invest and effectively utilize agricultural land. Emphasis is placed on attracting businesses that apply and transfer advanced technical and scientific technologies into production to increase productivity and output. This includes focusing on developing models for cultivating and processing medicinal herbs; developing economic models through joint ventures and partnerships in production; and developing raw material areas that yield high economic efficiency.
Tuesday,In the industrial sector, the district focuses on attracting investors to develop and build small industrial clusters within the district, namely: the Bong Khe Industrial Cluster, located in the area west of National Highway 7A leading to Khe Kem, with a planned area of 23 hectares; and the Yen Khe Concentrated Industrial Cluster, located in the southern limestone hill area of Yen Khe commune, on the road connecting the road to Khe Kem and the road from National Highway 7 to Luc Da and Mon Son communes, with a planned area of 115.10 hectares.
PV:In recent times, what solutions has Con Cuong district implemented to improve the investment environment and attract investors to the locality? Among these solutions, which is the focus?
Mr. Lo Van Thao:District Con Cuong has been continuously improving the quality of planning and plan implementation management to serve economic development needs. This includes focusing on completing the district planning for the period 2021-2030 with a vision to 2050, integrated into the Nghe An provincial planning for the period 2021-2030 with a vision to 2050, which has been approved by the Prime Minister; and implementing the general planning for Tra Lan town and the district-level regional planning, ensuring consistency and uniformity with other construction plans.
The district is focusing on mobilizing maximum resources to invest in the construction of a comprehensive socio-economic infrastructure system, with the immediate goal of completing several key projects such as: Thanh Nam Bridge over the Lam River; National Highway 7A to Khe Kem Waterfall; Bong Khe to Mon Son Road… It is also accelerating the completion of infrastructure in several small industrial zones and clusters to attract investors.
Con Cuong District is also effectively implementing investment incentive and support mechanisms and policies as stipulated by the Government, along with the best support conditions from the province; coordinating with investors to research and apply specific policies for large-scale projects; paying attention to training and improving the quality of human resources, especially technical workers and skilled laborers with industrial work ethics and high organizational discipline, to meet the requirements of businesses.
At the same time, the district continuously enhances the dynamism and pioneering spirit of leaders at all levels and in all sectors in supporting and accompanying investors and businesses; being flexible and creative in resolving issues; promptly identifying and resolving difficulties and obstacles in the investment, production, and business process; improving the awareness, responsibility, and public service ethics of officials and civil servants; ensuring good security, order, and social safety, creating a safe and healthy environment for investors and businesses to invest and develop with confidence. This is the core solution for Con Cuong district to attract investors.
PV:It is known that Con Cuong district recently attracted a garment factory project to the area. Could you elaborate on this positive development?
Mr. Lo Van Thao:With decisive action, Con Cuong district is beginning to see positive signs. Recently, Minh Anh Garment Company held a meeting with the District Party Committee Standing Committee and relevant departments and agencies, reaching an agreement to invest in a garment factory with a capacity to employ 3,000 workers. Both sides signed an agreement to coordinate the implementation of the factory's construction. Currently, the company is finalizing the documents to submit to the province for approval of the investment plan, with the goal of having the factory operational by August 2025. To ensure the factory starts operating soon, the company has initially organized recruitment, vocational training, and factory operation, creating jobs for 838 workers in the area.
Furthermore, in the first six months of 2024, the Provincial People's Committee approved the investment policy for two projects in Con Cuong district. These are: the Forest Products Processing Zone project in Bong Khe commune industrial cluster, invested by Phuong Dong Investment and Development Joint Stock Company, with a total investment of VND 73.99 billion; and the Construction Materials Processing Zone project in Bong Khe commune industrial cluster, invested by Tan Thanh 6 Nghe An Construction Materials Trading and Processing Joint Stock Company, with a total investment of VND 77.36 billion.
In addition, the A&B Group is surveying and expressing interest in investing in a 5-star resort at Khe Kèm Waterfall, within Pù Mát National Park. This is a tourism enterprise that has established a reputation both domestically and internationally with its chain of luxury hotels and resorts. The Dong A Medicinal Herbs Group has been seeking approval for investment in Con Cuông district with the desire to build a factory and cultivate medicinal herbs under the forest canopy to develop medicinal products.
PV:In the coming period, what solutions will Con Cuong district implement to boost investment attraction? What proposals and recommendations does the district have to achieve even better results?
Mr. Lo Van Thao:In accordance with the Action Program No. 68 CTr/TU of the Nghe An Provincial Party Committee and Resolution No. 137 of the National Assembly, Con Cuong district will focus on building and developing itself into a type 4 urban area with an ecological and tourism orientation. To achieve this, attracting investment plays a crucial role. To increase competitiveness in attracting investment, the district will focus on improving the investment environment, including: mobilizing domestic and foreign resources to build infrastructure serving development needs; resolutely implementing digital transformation; effectively implementing online public services at levels 3 and 4; improving the capacity for public administration reform, especially in terms of awareness, attitude, dynamism, and service-oriented approach towards citizens and businesses; and enhancing the responsibility of dedicated and professional officials and civil servants.
To create more favorable conditions for attracting investment, Con Cuong district hopes that the central government will soon develop and issue specific criteria and indicators for planning and building ecological urban areas..The Provincial People's Council and People's Committee will continue to pay attention to and create favorable conditions for the development and promulgation of specific mechanisms and policies on socio-economic development in the direction of regional and local linkages; create a legal framework and impetus for localities to effectively link, support, and develop the regional economy, especially, maximizing the advantages of forests and forest economy; continue to consider, allocate, and support resources to help localities invest in infrastructure systems; pay attention to organizing forums and investment promotion conferences so that localities have the opportunity to interact, exchange, introduce, and attract investors to research and survey investment in key projects in the area... Provincial departments and agencies will continue to create favorable conditions and support, and accompany the district in the work of promoting and attracting investment.
PV:Thank you, sir!
