Vice Chairman of the Provincial People's Committee Le Ngoc Hoa analyzed why Nghe An built the DDCI index.

PV:Could you please tell us about the necessity of issuing a Project to Assess the Competitiveness of Local Authorities and Departments, Branches and Sectors of Nghe An Province?

Comrade Le Ngoc Hoa:Since 2005, the Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry (VCCI) and the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) have regularly conducted assessments and published the Provincial Competitiveness Index (PCI) annually. In 2014, the Prime Minister included the PCI as a target to improve national competitiveness in Resolution 19. In addition, in January 2019, the Government issued Resolution No. 02/NQ-CP on continuing to implement key tasks and solutions to improve the business environment, including the PCI as a measure of improving the investment and business environment in Vietnam.

For Nghe An, in the last 4 years (2014 - 2018), PCI has had remarkable improvements, in 2018 ranked 19th out of 63 provinces and cities and entered the top 20 for the first time, continuing to be the leading province in the North Central region. This result shows the recognition of the business community for the province's efforts in recent times, and at the same time demonstrates the efforts of authorities at all levels and people in administrative reform and investment attraction.

PCI ranking position of Nghe An province from 2011 to 2018.

One of the initiatives to improve PCI is to develop and apply a set of indicators to assess the competitiveness of local governments and departments, agencies and branches (DDCI). Since 2013, many provinces and cities have conducted surveys and assessments of departments, agencies and branches and district-level localities using many different models. By the end of 2018, 28 provinces and cities nationwide had implemented surveys and assessments of the DDCI. In Nghe An, the development and implementation of DDCI assessment has not been carried out.

In 2018, the Provincial People's Committee assigned the Center for Social Sciences and Humanities to pilot a survey and assessment of the competitiveness of 17 departments, branches, and 21 districts, towns, and cities.

The survey results have assessed quite comprehensively and objectively the economic management capacity and business environment improvement of departments, branches, sectors and districts, towns and cities. However, the index set has not been completed. In order to fully, comprehensively and accurately assess, it is necessary to continue to complete the DDCI assessment index set and organize regular assessments, thereby improving the business environment and enhancing the provincial competitiveness PCI. Therefore, the Provincial People's Committee has developed the Project "Assessing the competitiveness of local authorities and departments, branches and sectors of Nghe An province - DDCI". This is one of the important tasks to implement the administrative reform year of the province.

Inspecting administrative reform work in Hung Loc commune (Vinh city). Photo: Thanh Le

PV:So, what are the goals of the Project, comrade?

Comrade Le Ngoc Hoa:DDCI is a set of indicators to assess the administrative capacity of departments, branches, sectors and localities in the province. DDCI surveys are based on the satisfaction level of investors, enterprises, individual business households, and cooperatives that are investing, operating in production and business in the province to study solutions to improve PCI annually; at the same time, propose solutions to rectify and overcome the limitations and shortcomings of the surveyed areas. Investors, organizations and individuals participating in the DDCI survey demonstrate their role in monitoring the government system regarding the attitude and quality of public administrative services of localities.

The project aims to objectively assess the management capacity of local government leaders and departments, branches and sectors in performing functions and tasks directly related to investors and enterprises; create competition and emulation in the quality of management of departments, branches and sectors and local governments. Thereby, creating motivation for drastic and synchronous administrative reform; creating a favorable environment for investment, production and business activities in all fields. At the same time, creating a reliable and widespread information channel for enterprises to participate in contributing ideas to build local governments and departments, branches and sectors to improve the quality of public administrative services and enhance the quality of support, remove difficulties and accompany enterprises.

Comrade Le Ngoc Hoa:The scope of the Project's research is enterprises, cooperatives, individual business households that are operating, producing, trading, and implementing investment projects in Nghe An province. The subjects assessed by DDCI are departments, branches, sectors and People's Committees of districts, towns and cities of Nghe An province. In which, the group of departments, branches and sectors (23 units related to business activities) and the group of district-level People's Committees include 21 units of districts, towns and cities.

The project is implemented through investigation and survey combined with the use of many appropriate and effective methods, including: Direct survey (main method, accounting for 60%) chaired by VCCI Nghe An. Direct survey conducted at enterprises and at the one-stop, one-stop-shop departments of the Provincial Public Administration Service Center and departments, branches, sectors, People's Committees of districts, towns and cities. In addition, surveys are conducted by mail (post office and email, accounting for 20%); online surveys account for 20%.

PV:Thank you, comrade!

Construction Department staff performing professional duties. Photo: Thanh Le

After studying the PCI index indicators, reviewing the DDCI assessment models of the provinces, through the results of the pilot survey and coordinating with the VCCI Nghe An branch, the Project to build the DDCI index of Nghe An province includes 8 component indexes for departments, branches, sectors and local authorities including: Transparency and access to information; Dynamism of departments, branches, sectors and local authorities; Time costs; Informal costs; Fair competition; Business support; Legal institutions; Role of the leader. The DDCI index is determined through calculating 8 component indexes and standardizing on a 100-point scale. The scores of the assessment indexes of the units are standardized to the same scale for comparison.