Exploiting land funds for urban development

(Baonghean.vn) - In the context of Vinh city's limited budget, generating revenue from land plays an important role in serving infrastructure construction and socio-economic development.

On May 13, 2015, Vinh City issued Decision No. 2145 on allowing land auctions when infrastructure is not yet completed and using the money from land fund exploitation as counterpart capital for site clearance of Vinh Urban Development Sub-project items. Therefore, to achieve the target of 300 billion VND in revenue from land fund, Vinh City as well as wards and communes are making many efforts, however, the implementation process is facing many difficulties and obstacles.

In recent years, Quan Bau Ward - Vinh City is a locality with a relatively large land fund that has been planned, divided into lots, and auctioned to create a budget source for infrastructure construction and promote socio-economic development. Currently, the land fund for exploitation in Quan Bau Ward is still large, but mainly scattered, fragmented, small plots, difficult to plan for division, auction and some plots are converted from two-rice land to other land.

Mr. Tran Anh Tuan - Vice Chairman of Quan Bau Ward People's Committee shared: In 2015, the ward was assigned the target of exploiting land fund of 15 billion VND. To achieve this revenue, the ward has deployed planning for 6 land plots, of which 1 plot does not require compensation for site clearance, the ward will organize an auction in July. As for the remaining planning areas, the ward is focusing on resolving difficulties and problems to organize auctions in the coming time.

Construction of the North Canal Bridge -Vinh Urban Development Sub-project

In 2015, Vinh city assigned 25 wards and communes in the area to exploit land funds with a total revenue of 200 billion VND. Assigned to the Land Fund Development Center to exploit with a revenue of 100 billion VND. Up to this point, the city has organized auctions and exploited land funds with an amount of 60 billion VND, of which the Land Fund Development Center received 40 billion VND and the wards and communes have only exploited land funds of 20 billion VND, reaching 10% of the assigned target. Thus, in the remaining time of 2015, the wards and communes must concentrate their maximum efforts to complete the remaining 90% of the target. This can be said to be a difficult problem for the wards and communes in the city center when the clean land fund for exploitation has almost been exhausted over the years. As for the wards and communes in the suburbs, the abundant land fund is less attractive to people because it is far from the city center.

Mr. Nguyen Tat Son - Director of Vinh City Land Fund Development Center said: The process of exploiting land fund has encountered many difficulties such as: The process of bringing out clean land fund for auction takes a lot of time and has to go through many departments and branches. Land price for compensation and support for agricultural land is very low, even much lower than the 2003 Land Law, leading to difficulties in compensating people.

To complete the assigned targets, the Land Fund Development Center and 25 wards and communes need to have solutions to create clean land funds for auctions. In the immediate future, wards and communes need to focus on exploiting low-cost but highly effective land plots, while focusing on planning small land plots to serve low-income people and people with land use needs; planning land plots with diverse areas and reviewing small land plots for auctions. In addition, the Land Fund Development Center will develop a land fund investment process, focusing on time, implementation steps, and administrative procedures for wards and communes in the area; prioritizing the quick resolution of administrative procedures related to land fund exploitation such as: planning, planning approval, investment policies, design documents, site clearance, land price construction, etc., reducing the time by half compared to before.

Mr. Nguyen Tat Son - Director of Vinh City Land Fund Development Center added: To remove difficulties for wards, communes, the city and specialized departments regularly go to each locality to remove obstacles and difficulties in the implementation process. In particular, to ensure counterpart funds and ensure the progress of the Vinh urban development project funded by the World Bank, in 2015, the city needs to arrange 322.6 billion VND in counterpart funds, so on May 13, 2015, the city issued Official Letter No. 2145 on allowing land auctions in planning areas when infrastructure is not yet completed.

Thus, in the coming time, when the compensation for land acquisition and clearance for people is completed, along with the construction of infrastructure for planning areas, the city proposes that the Provincial People's Committee allow the public announcement of the auction to shorten the time for localities to speed up the progress of land exploitation. In addition, the Provincial People's Committee and departments and branches also need to create conditions for the City People's Committee to set the starting price before the auction according to the price list issued by the Provincial People's Committee. Only then can Vinh city soon complete the assigned target of land exploitation, thereby creating a source of counterpart capital to invest in the construction of Vinh urban development projects.

Vo Huyen