Many challenges in restructuring public finance

	“Stability of public finances creates room to handle the difficulties of the economy”
	Promote the implementation of audit recommendations to prevent violations in public financial management

Vietnam has achieved many results from its efforts to reform public finance.

Quite comprehensive progress

Public finance reform is one of the 6 contents of state administrative reform in the period of 2021 - 2030 according to Resolution 76/NQ-CP dated July 15, 2021 of the Government and this is an important task, contributing to supporting other tasks, promoting socio-economic development and international integration of the country, improving national competitiveness.

Dr. Bui Tien Hanh, Head of the Faculty of Public Finance, Academy of Finance, said that the main results from the efforts to reform public finance in Vietnam in the period from 2015 to present have made good progress, quite comprehensive. Accordingly, the budget scope is determined more comprehensively and fully according to international practices; strengthening fiscal discipline and state budget management which leads to a reduction in public debt; budget transparency is enhanced; improve the efficiency of budget allocation and use of public financial resources.

Specifically, the policy to mobilize the State budget continues to be improved, supplemented, closely following the set goals and orientations; the policies on taxes, fees, and charges issued basically ensure transparency, simplicity, and are consistent with commitments on international integration; digital transformation in budget revenue management contributes to administrative reform and combats fraud and revenue loss in budget revenue management. Total state budget revenue tends to increase and achieves the set targets, contributing to ensuring the sustainability of the state budget and resources to implement socio-economic development goals.

In addition, the allocation and use of financial resources continue to be improved, ensuring the allocation of public financial resources in a transparent manner, prioritizing important tasks, regions, and subjects with many difficulties. The legal framework on public debt and public debt management has been improved in accordance with the reality in Vietnam and in line with international good practices. Along with that, State-owned enterprises continue to be innovated, arranged, restructured, and streamlined in number, contributing to the development and improvement of business efficiency of SOEs.

According to the assessment of Associate Professor, Dr. Dinh Trong Thinh, the Government and ministries and branches have been implementing administrative reforms, promoting digitalization in administrative management, building data warehouses to optimize the allocation and use of public resources, helping to increase publicity, transparency, reduce waste and improve efficiency in resource management. Public administrative services are increasingly digitized, promoted to be implemented online, creating convenience for people and businesses.

Many pressures on public financial resources

Emphasizing some difficulties and challenges for public financial reform in Vietnam, Dr. Bui Tien Hanh said that macroeconomic instability has a strong impact on public financial security and safety. Vietnam still needs to continue to maintain economic stimulus measures, increase investment and consumption to maintain growth momentum, and ensure fiscal space to respond to complex and unexpected developments in the world economy, which puts great pressure on public financial resources.

At the same time, although public debt is still within the safe limit and the public debt structure has positive changes, the Government's direct debt repayment obligations and borrowing to repay principal debt tend to increase, creating pressure to balance the budget to repay principal debt, ensure public debt safety and public debt space to implement fiscal policies to stabilize the macro economy, promote growth and sustainable economic development.

From the perspective of restructuring state-owned enterprises, Mr. Nguyen Dinh Son, Deputy Chief Auditor of the State Audit Department VI, said that although there have been certain achievements, the mechanism for managing state capital in enterprises in Vietnam still has many problems that need to be overcome, such as: waste and loss in the use of state capital; many state-owned enterprises still do not have a clear reporting and performance evaluation system, making management difficult, etc.

According to Associate Professor, Dr. Dinh Trong Thinh, the decentralization and delegation of authority between levels of government in the management of public resources have been gradually implemented. However, because public resources are very diverse, rich and complex, the distinction between levels of government is not clear, management still has loopholes, and the power of public resources has not been truly promoted in socio-economic development.

Emphasizing that the allocation and effective use of public resources play an important role in the sustainable development of Vietnam, requiring efforts from both the government and the people's supervision, Associate Professor, Dr. Dinh Trong Thinh recommended that it is necessary to gradually improve the law on the allocation, management and use of public resources, accordingly, it is necessary to quickly deploy and fully and comprehensively implement relevant laws and legal documents to ensure the legal basis and transparency in the allocation, management and use of public resources.

At the same time, it is necessary to promote institutional and policy reforms to facilitate the more effective use of public resources, promote forms of public-private partnership (PPP) investment to reduce financial pressure on the State, and promote the role of inspection and supervision of the use of the State budget and public assets to prevent loss and corruption.

In order to improve the effectiveness of state capital management, according to Mr. Nguyen Dinh Son, the management capacity of heads of state-owned enterprises needs to be further improved. At the same time, it is necessary to perfect the legal framework related to public financial management, strengthen inspection, examination and supervision of the financial situation of state-owned enterprises. In addition, it is necessary to develop standards and indicators to evaluate the effectiveness of state capital use in a scientific and transparent manner.