Minister Nguyen Chi Dung chaired the meeting of the State Appraisal Council to appraise the adjustment of the investment policy of the Long Thanh International Airport project.

(MPI) - Under the chairmanship of Minister Nguyen Chi Dung, Head of the Appraisal Team, on November 1, 2024, at the headquarters of the Ministry of Planning and Investment, a meeting of the State Appraisal Council took place to appraise the adjustment of the investment policy of the Long Thanh International Airport project.

Attending the meeting were Lieutenant General Pham Truong Son, Deputy Chief of the General Staff of the Vietnam People's Army; Mr. Nguyen Ngoc Canh, Vice Chairman of the State Capital Management Committee at Enterprises; Mr. Nguyen Duy Lam, Deputy Minister of Transport ; Mr. Nguyen Tien Viet, Deputy General Director of ACV and representatives of relevant ministries and branches in Decision No. 1184/QD-TTg October 14, 2024 on the establishment of the State Appraisal Council to appraise the adjustment of the investment policy of the Long Thanh International Airport Project. Also attending the meeting were representatives of relevant units of the Ministry of Planning and Investment and the Ministry of Transport.

Minister Nguyen Chi Dung speaks at the meeting. Photo: MPI

Speaking at the opening of the meeting, Minister Nguyen Chi Dung said that this is a particularly important, large-scale project with high requirements. Recently, the National Assembly passed Resolution No. 94/2015/QH13 dated June 25, 2015 on the investment policy of the Long Thanh International Airport project with the goal of building Long Thanh International Airport to level 4F according to the classification of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), an important international airport of the country, aiming to become one of the international aviation transit centers of the region. The Prime Minister also approved the project phase 1 and it is currently being implemented.

Up to now, the Ministry of Transport has submitted a report proposing to adjust the investment policy of the Long Thanh International Airport project, phase 1. Accordingly, the Prime Minister has established a State Appraisal Council to appraise the adjustment of the investment policy of the Long Thanh International Airport project. According to the agenda of the 8th session of the 15th National Assembly, National Assembly deputies will give opinions and consider approving the Resolution on adjusting the investment policy of the Long Thanh International Airport project in Resolution No. 94/2015/QH13 of the National Assembly. Therefore, Minister Nguyen Chi Dung requested that Council members give their opinions frankly and responsibly, focusing directly on the issues proposed for adjustment.

Briefly presenting the Project content, Mr. Nguyen Duy Lam, Deputy Minister of Transport, said that the scale of the Project: Investing in construction of Project items to achieve a capacity of 100 million passengers/year and 5 million tons of cargo/year.

Total investment: estimated for the entire Project is 336,630 billion VND (equivalent to 16.03 billion USD, applying the unit price of 2014), of which phase 1 is 114,450 billion VND (equivalent to 5.45 billion USD). The Project uses a part of the state budget capital, official development assistance capital (ODA), capital from equitization of state-owned enterprises in the aviation industry, corporate capital, investment capital in the form of public-private partnership (PPP) and other types of capital according to the provisions of law.

Applied technology: The project applies modern technologies in construction, management and operation like advanced international airports in the world, ensuring synchronous exploitation capacity according to the criteria of safety, convenience, quality and efficiency.

Phase 1: Invest in the construction of 01 runway and 01 passenger terminal along with synchronous auxiliary items with a capacity of 25 million passengers/year, 1.2 million tons of cargo/year; completed and put into operation by 2025 at the latest.

Phase 2: Continue to invest in building 01 more open-configuration runway and 01 passenger terminal to reach a capacity of 50 million passengers/year and 1.5 million tons of cargo/year;

Phase 3: Complete the Project items to achieve a capacity of 100 million passengers/year and 05 million tons of cargo/year.

The Government directed the preparation of a feasibility study report for each phase of the Project and reported to the National Assembly for approval before deciding on investment.

The proposed adjustment of the investment policy was approved by the National Assembly in Resolution No. 94/2015/QH13 dated June 25, 2015, including investment in the construction of an additional runway in phase 1 of the project; adjustment of the implementation time of phase 1 of the project to 2026; preparation of a feasibility study report and investment decision for each phase of the project in accordance with the provisions of law.

According to the representative of the Ministry of Transport, the adjustment is to meet the exploitation needs when 01 runway is malfunctioning; ensure the continuous exploitation of the Port; increase investment efficiency. The proposals do not change the total investment, do not change the scale of the project, only change the scale of the project phase 1.

Giving opinions at the meeting, delegates basically agreed with the dossier submitted by the Ministry of Transport, which basically had all the items as prescribed in Clause 1, Article 26 of Decree No. 29/2021/ND-CP of the Government. Regarding the project's pre-feasibility study report, it is proposed to supplement the project's nature; current status, land boundaries; traffic connections, technical infrastructure around the project; and explain the airport's conformity with the Long Thanh International Airport planning approved by the Prime Minister in Decision 909/QD-TTg dated June 14, 2006.

Opinions also focused on exchanging and discussing the legal basis for adjustment and proposed additions to the Law on Environmental Protection, the Law on Construction and Resolutions related to component projects of land acquisition, compensation, resettlement support, Decree No. 29/2021/ND-CP dated March 26, 2021 of the Government to ensure more rigor. At the same time, assess the adjustment of the scale of phase 1 of the project; assess the analysis and preliminary selection of key technologies, techniques and conditions for providing materials, equipment, raw materials, energy, services, and infrastructure for additional items; assess the preliminary determination of the total investment in phase 1, capital mobilization plan; on the preliminary determination of operating, maintenance, repair and major repair costs during the project's operation phase; on the expected implementation progress; financial efficiency, socio-economic efficiency, national defense, security and sustainable development;…

Concluding the meeting, Minister Nguyen Chi Dung highly appreciated the working spirit as well as the opinions of the members of the Appraisal Council; based on the comments, the Minister requested the standing body of the Council to promptly synthesize and complete the conclusion of the appraisal meeting. On that basis, he requested the Ministry of Transport to promptly study, absorb, explain and clarify the issues raised by the delegates and complete the report to report to the competent authority as prescribed.

Accordingly, it is necessary to clarify the reasons, highlight the need to adjust investment policies, assess impacts and effectiveness to achieve the set goals, improve competitiveness, serve national development; create an economy revolving around this airport, not simply a transit point; be the nucleus, the center, make a great contribution to the economy, contribute to the realization of the goal of the nation's rising era./.

Tung Linh

Ministry of Planning and Investment

Source: https://www.mpi.gov.vn/portal/Pages/2024-11-1/Bo-truong-Nguyen-Chi-Dung-chu-tri-Phien-hop-Hoi-do5nt9we.aspx