Over 75 billion VND paid for forest environmental services in 2016

(Baonghean.vn) - On the afternoon of December 23, the Provincial People's Committee held a meeting of the Forest Protection and Development Fund Management Board to evaluate the results of the implementation of the forest environmental service payment plan in 2016; and key tasks for 2017. Comrade Dinh Viet Hong - Vice Chairman of the Provincial People's Committee chaired the meeting.

Comrade Dinh Viet Hong - Vice Chairman of the Provincial People's Committee, Chairman of the Management Board of the Forest Protection and Development Fund directed the meeting.

2016 is the 5th year that Nghe An province has organized the operation of the Forest Protection and Development Fund in conjunction with the implementation of the forest environmental service payment policy according to Decree 99/2010/ND-CP. Up to now, the mobilized revenue has reached nearly 300 billion VND (accounting for about 5% of the country's total revenue). Of which, the revenue in 2016 (as of December 15) reached over 53 billion VND.

According to the report of the Forest Protection and Development Fund, in 2016, the Fund continued to disburse over 75.4 billion VND. Of which, over 65.9 billion VND was spent on forest environmental services for 6,559 forest owners (11 forest owners are organizations, 51 commune People's Committees, 6,497 households, individuals, and communities with long-term land allocation); over 9.4 billion VND was spent on replacement forest planting for projects.

With financial resources collected from forest environmental services, forest management, protection and development work associated with job creation, livelihood improvement, income increase and life improvement for forest workers and ethnic minorities in mountainous areas have been better; contributing to stabilizing political security, order and safety in localities, especially in mountainous areas and highland border areas.

Mr. Nguyen Khac Lam - Director of the Forest Protection and Development Fund proposed some solutions to handle existing problems and shortcomings.

However, there are some shortcomings and inadequacies in the implementation of forest environmental service policies. That is, the payment unit price in the basins is not uniform, some hydropower basins such as Khe Bo, Sao Va, Nam Pong... have very low payment levels, only from 20,000 - 60,000 VND/ha; leading to a situation of inference and comparison from forest owners, making it difficult to motivate people to actively protect and develop forests.

In addition, the collection of fees for converting forest use to other purposes according to Decree No. 05/2008/ND-CP from 2012 and earlier still faces many difficulties; the implementation of revenue sources from industrial production establishments using water resources still faces many obstacles; Circular 26/2015/TT-BNNPTNT stipulates that replacement forestation can only be arranged for protective and special-use forests, leading to impacts on progress...

In 2017, the fund management agency expects total revenue from forest environmental services to be about 52.7 billion VND (of which, revenue from the source of entrusted payment for forest environmental services is about 49.7 billion VND); the planned expenditure is 52.7 billion VND.

Based on the reality of forest environmental service revenue and expenditure activities, the members of the Fund Management Board focused on discussing the 2017 financial revenue and expenditure plan; the issue of projects that are slow to fulfill their obligations; the handling of projects that change forest use purposes but have not yet paid for reforestation compensation; the plan to use the reserve fund to support additional unit prices in 2016 for basins with low unit prices under 200,000 VND/ha; reviewing the source of money for forest environmental services in residual hydropower basins; establishing a commune-level Forest Protection and Development Fund in eligible places...

Through the forest environmental service policy, forest protection and development work in the province has been increasingly improved. In the photo: Leaders of Que Phong district visited the nursery of Pu Hoat Nature Reserve to plan to improve forest planting work in the area.

Concluding the meeting, comrade Dinh Viet Hong basically agreed with the contents of the report and plan of the fund management agency and the contents of the fund members' discussions. The Vice Chairman of the province requested the fund management agency to rebuild the revenue and expenditure plan for 2017 in the direction of striving to increase the revenue level, promptly submit it to relevant departments for appraisal so that the Provincial People's Committee can approve it; remind them to pay attention to the work of inspection and examination of forest environmental service payments associated with forest protection and development.

In addition, direct the review of current legal regulations to advise on perfecting the members of the Fund Council, the Board of Supervisors and handling existing and inappropriate contents./.

Nhat Lan