Business Support

The spirit of government accompanying and serving businesses is only truly effective when the management agency puts itself in the role of business owner, not creating additional barriers or unofficial costs for businesses.

Mr. Nguyen Van Nghia started a new working day with a series of calls to ask partners in other localities about the business situation, especially the output for construction materials products.

As the owner of a construction materials factory, he has almost run out of capital and energy after a long time fighting the Covid-19 epidemic.

During that time, he was almost lost. The company's production was limited because there was no output, almost shrinking as small as possible, trying to protect itself. All intentions of production and business stopped, Mr. Nghia had to consider ways to recover capital.

In fact, many businesses are facing even more difficulties, falling into a state of "clinical death", even ceasing operations and going bankrupt.

Support capital and resolve barriers for businesses, creating an open investment environment. Photo: HL

However, even in the most difficult times, I still believe that there is always a rainbow in the rain. The epidemic will be controlled, and the epidemic prevention policy will change direction. What I need to do is to persevere and prepare for recovery.

Reality has proven Mr. Nghia's belief. When the epidemic situation was under control, the Government and localities adjusted their strategies, thoroughly implementing the "new normal", with many support policies and promoting economic recovery being implemented.

The Provincial People's Committee implements programs and plans to support business development; focuses on implementing policies and solutions of the Government and central ministries and branches; issues a Plan to implement the Program for socio-economic recovery and development in the province according to the policies of the National Assembly and the Government; establishes a special working group to remove difficulties for businesses.

Many businesses have proactively adapted to adverse changes, ensuring the maintenance of production and business, quickly seizing new business opportunities; and applying digital technology in production and business.

Like other businesses, Mr. Nghia boldly seized the opportunity to start restoring production. However, things were not easy, when the supply and demand chain was broken, products were left unsold, and businesses had difficulty recovering capital.

In particular, recently, businesses are still "surrounded" by high bank interest rates, while banks are still hesitant and have not reduced lending rates. On the other hand, to borrow money, there are many cumbersome procedures and it is difficult to access. In addition, input costs such as raw materials, fuel, and materials are increasing. This is when businesses are at their "weakest", in great need of companionship and support from the government and other sectors.

The question is what support does the business need?

Speeding up the progress of major projects creates development momentum. Photo: HL

A plus point in recent times is that the spirit of "accompanying and serving" has been strongly promoted by the province to ensure that businesses coming to do administrative procedures will be fully guided, easy to understand, and only have to supplement information, edit records and documents no more than once.

Efforts to create a favorable business environment, reducing costs and time for businesses are spreading. From there, the phenomenon of businesses having to travel back and forth, each time just to fulfill a different request, has been and is being overcome.

During dialogues between the Provincial People's Committee and businesses, or the Business-Entrepreneur Coffee program, besides concerns about capital sources, businesses' most common complaints are about barriers from planning, auctions, investment approval procedures, environmental impact assessment, trademark certification, food safety, and trade promotion.

According to a business owner, how to make legal regulations simple, easy to understand, and facilitate businesses in fully complying with obligations is a top concern.

Some businesses reported that they had encountered policy problems, but when they reported to the government or authorities, the waiting time for resolution was too long. By the time support activities were implemented, businesses had lost business opportunities.

If the business environment is reformed more strongly, if management agencies truly put businesses at the center of support instead of banning what cannot be managed, or setting difficult conditions, it will certainly create motivation for businesses.

Of course, there is still much to be done to support businesses to overcome difficulties. In the immediate future, it is necessary to urgently review legal obstacles and barriers to free up resources for investment in production and business. Propose solutions to remove difficulties in legal matters and investment and construction procedures for real estate projects.

Support cost reduction for businesses, increase access to preferential capital sources and state support resources.

Continue to improve the investment and business environment, reduce and simplify regulations related to business activities; regulations that are not specific, overlapping, or contradictory in the fields of investment, land, construction, resources, environment, and other fields to ensure consistency, synchronization, transparency, ease of reference, understanding, and accessibility.

Promote digital transformation and innovation in enterprises; Support labor restructuring, improve the quality of human resources to meet the requirements of innovation and the 4.0 industrial revolution.

And finally, as Chairman of the Provincial People's Committee Le Ngoc Tuan said, only when the government and management agencies put themselves in the role of business owners, not creating additional barriers or unofficial costs for businesses, can they truly "accompany and serve".

Hong Lam