Country saves nearly VND54,000 billion

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Minister of Finance Ho Duc Phuc reports to the National Assembly on thrift practices and waste prevention in 2022. Photo: Quochoi.vn

On the morning of May 23, 2023, under the chair of National Assembly Chairman Vuong Dinh Hue, the National Assembly listened to reports on thrift practices and waste prevention in 2022.

Under the authorization of the Prime Minister, Minister of Finance Ho Duc Phuc presented the report.

Strengthen inspection and strictly handle acts causing waste and loss

According to Minister Ho Duc Phuc, implementing the Resolutions of the National Assembly, the Government and the Prime Minister have directed ministries, branches and localities to seriously implement and achieve positive results such as control, promulgating or submitting to competent authorities for promulgation of regulations related to thrift practice, anti-waste, norms, standards and regimes; thoroughly implement state budget savings; strengthen inspection and strictly handle acts causing loss and waste in the management and use of state budget capital, public property, land and minerals.

Regarding the results of thrift practice and anti-wastefulness in making, appraising and approving estimates, finalization, management and use of state budget funds, Minister Ho Duc Phuc said thanks to the initiative in managing, the state budget expenditure tasks in 2022 have completed the set targets.

Specifically, as reported by ministries, branches and localities, the total saving of state budget and capital in 2022 is 53,887 billion VND.

Regarding public debt management, by 2022, Vietnam's public debt is estimated to be about 3.6 million billion VND, equivalent to 38% of GDP (down from 43.1% of GDP in 2021); The structure of public debt and government debt continues to be improved according to the 5-year public debt repayment and borrowing plan for the 2021-2025 period and the orientation of the Public Debt Strategy to 2030.

In purchasing and using working means and equipment of agencies and organizations in the state sector, management and use of public assets, the Minister of Finance said, the system of documents detailing and guiding the implementation of the Law on Management and Use of Public Assets has been promulgated relatively synchronously, creating a legal basis for strict management and sparing use of the public property. As a result, the management and procurement of public assets at ministries, branches and localities in 2022 will continue to change, ensuring strictness and thrift.

Institutional reform on public investment continues to receive attention, creating a unified, synchronous and complete legal basis to improve the effectiveness of the management of investment activities and the use of public investment capital, timely removing difficulties and obstacles in project implementation, contributing to speeding up the disbursement of public investment capital.

However, the Government's report clearly states that the planning of state budget investment of some projects is not close to the implementation capacity; the disbursement rate of public investment capital is still low compared to the assigned plan, especially the additional capital of the National Assembly for the program of socio-economic recovery and development has not yet created a driving force to promote economic growth.

Minister of Finance Ho Duc Phuc. Photo: Quochoi.vn

In managing and using offices and official residences, the Ministry of Finance has approved a plan to rearrange and handle housing and land according to its competence for 30,708 housing and land facilities of ministries, central agencies, and state-owned enterprises. However, the rearrangement of housing and land facilities of some agencies, units, localities and state-owned enterprises is still slow. In addition, local land use planning is slow to publish, making it difficult to arrange houses, land, and relocate.

In the management, exploitation and use of natural resources, the whole country has converted nearly 20 thousand hectares of agricultural land to non-agricultural purposes; inspect, handle, recover, and cancel investment policies for projects that are slow to deploy or put into use with an area of over 10,000 hectares. However, there is still a situation of wasting land and water resources; Violations in the management and use of land, natural resources, minerals and the environment also occur in many places.

The situation of smuggling and trade fraud is still complicated

Also, according to the Government's report, the system of mechanisms and policies to serve the process of reorganizing, renovating, restructuring and improving the performance of state-owned enterprises has been fully promulgated and continues to be improved. There have been 18/19 corporations and corporations that have developed a restructuring plan for 2021-2025 and are continuing to complete it to submit to the competent authorities for promulgation. In 2022, businesses divested with a value of about VND 883.7 billion, earning VND4,290.6 billion. However, the progress of equitization and divestment of state-owned enterprises is still slow. In addition, handling some projects and enterprises that are behind schedule and inefficiently is still limited.

In the people's production, business and consumption activities, consumer demand stimulation programs and concentrated promotional months are held simultaneously in localities across the country, and shopping demand increases. However, Minister of Finance Ho Duc Phuc said that smuggling and commercial fraud is still complicated.

Regarding the tasks and solutions to practice thrift and combat waste in 2023, the Minister of Finance said that the Prime Minister issued Decision No. 1658 on the Master Program on thrift practice and waste prevention in 2023 with 8 key tasks and 4 solution groups to implement.

Accordingly, the ministries, branches and localities within their respective management are responsible for uniformly directing the formulation of plans for the implementation of savings goals and targets in each field they are assigned to be in charge of, to step up propagating and disseminating laws, guidelines and policies of the Party and State on thrift practice and fight against waste; to step up and improve the efficiency of inspection and examination of the implementation of the law on thrift practice, anti-waste and specialized legislation, focusing on the following areas: land management and use; public investment; budget management for science and technology career; compiling and publishing textbooks.