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Investors tell Laos to cut paperwork, curb mismanagement
Vietnamese businesspeople Monday called on leaders of the Laos government to expedite administrative reforms for foreign investors.
Speaking at a conference in Ho Chi Minh City Monday, Nguyen Van An, chairman and CEO of Thai Hoa Corporation, said immediate changes in Laos would be crucial “to fortify our enthusiasm to invest in this emerging market.”
He said improving state management and administrative reforms would be the key tasks that could enable Laos to attract more foreign direct investment (FDI).
According to Ministry of Planning and Investment in Laos, Vietnamese investors have invested in about 186 projects, worth a total of over US$2 billion, in the Laos to date.
The ministry said 161 of the investments had been at least partially disbursed and implemented.
Vietnam is now one of Laos’ top-three foreign investors, out of a total of 32, said the Ministry.
But An said foreign investors in Laos often ran into insurmountable roadblocks.
He said complicated land granting procedures has slowed down his company’s rubber project in Savanakhet Province.
“The paperwork is stuck at the Laos Ministry of Agriculture due to a restrictive provincial policy that grants only 100 hectares of land to foreign investors,” he said.
“We need at least 300 hectares for our $65-million project, which has already been licensed,” he added.
Nguyen Ngoc Tien, chairman and CEO of Tan Thinh Loi Investment Corporation, said his company had been asked to return land in southern Champasak Province’s Pak-Soong District to make way for a different Thai-invested project.
He said the Tan Thinh Loi project had already planted 100 hectares of coffee and had planned to plant another 750 hectares this year.
“But the local government has asked us to move to a new area of over 1,000 hectares in the same province,” he said. “Mismanagement at Laos state agencies has begun to wear on investor’s confidence.”
Phan Van Thanh, chairman of the Saigon Industry Corporation, said he had been waiting “for ages” for the approval of a dustbin manufacturing project aiming to coincide with Sea Games 25.
“The Sea Games are coming soon but the paperwork is still lying on the Laos authorities’ desk,” he said. “We’ll loose the opportunity to Chinese, Korean, Russian and Thai investors due to this slow process.”
In response, Laos Permanent Deputy Prime Minister and chairman of Vietnam-Laos cooperation committee Somsavat Lengsavad said that foreigners wanting to invest in plots of land over 100 hectares needed special prime ministerial approval.
Over 10,000 hectares needed approval from the National Assembly, he said.
“This allows us to avoid any breach of law in land granting.”
According to Vietnam’s Ministry of Industry and Trade, the current two-way trade between Laos and Vietnam reaches just nearly $500 million despite many multi-million dollar projects funded by Vietnamese investors.
“We no longer expect to reach the $1-billion bilateral trade target for 2010,” said chairman of Bank for Investment and Development of Vietnam (BIDV) Tran Bac Ha.
Vinh Bao
thanhnien
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