|
BUSINESS IN BRIEF 21/1
Game developers establish federation
The Vietnam Game Developers Federation (VGDF) was recently
established by the Vietnam Digital Communication Association and five local
game companies.
The local companies are eMobi Game, Digital Fish, DigiWave,
GrepGame and Tofu.
VGDF aims to support and boost sustainable and creative
development of the Vietnamese game industry, increasing its competitiveness
in the world. It will act as a community of Vietnamese game developers to
raise game-related issues such as taxes, preferential policies and issuance
management.
The federation will represent the Vietnamese game community in
organising and participating in national and international game fairs and
conferences. It will also act as a bridge between local game studios and
international game publishers.
Globaltrans Air seeks to operate aviation services
Transport Minister Dinh La Thang has received a proposal,
requesting him to grant permission to Globaltrans Air SJC, to operate as a
general aviation service provider.
The proposal has been submitted by the Civil Aviation
Authority of Viet Nam (CAAV), the Dien Dan Doanh Nghiep (Business Forum)
newspaper reported.
If approved, Globaltrans Air will become the fourth business
to operate in the general aviation sector in the country, apart from the Viet
Nam Helicopter Corporation, the Viet Nam Air Service Company (VASCO) and Hai
Au Aviation JSC.
General aviation is defined as civil aviation operations other
than traditional scheduled air services. It covers a large number of aviation
activities, for both commercial and non-commercial purposes, including flying
clubs, rescue, leisure and agricultural aviation.
January CPI seen edging down
The Consumer Price Index (CPI) in January will fluctuate
slightly and see a minor reduction, the Price Management Department under the
Ministry of Finance, forecast.
January is the month before the Tet holiday, so prices in the
local market are affected by some factors, including production demand,
processing and consumption of goods for the Tet festival, while purchasing
power experiences solvency at the end of the year, which pressures prices,
the department pointed out.
However, there will be some positive factors supporting the
stability of the local market and price increases will be controlled,
including a slight decrease in prices of essential goods and materials in the
global market, the department said.
In the domestic market, ministries, provinces/cities and
enterprises will collaborate in preparation for Tet, and implement price
stabilisation and market inspection, in accordance with the Prime Minister's
directions.
These enterprises will also launch trade promotions and
discount programmes during the last month of the lunar year to reduce the
chances of price increases in the market, the department stated.
Additionally, the reduction in petrol and gas prices and
transportation fee, will stabilise the prices of sugar and milk for younger
children (below six years), as well as steel and medicines, reported chinhphu.vn.
Vietcombank Securities Company also said CPI in January is
expected to slip by 0.35 to 0.45 per cent against December, but increase by
0.6 to 0.7 per cent, compared with the same period last year, the Thoi bao
Kinh te
Purchasing power has not seen strong recovery, while the
reduction in petrol and energy prices, will help enterprises cut input costs,
resulting in the prices of goods and services dropping.
According to the department, rice and food prices could
increase and benefit production and consumption during the Tet festival, but
the price appreciation will not be much due to stable supply.
According to the Customs Bureau,
The export figure was $1.87 billion higher than in 2013 and
accounted for 21 per cent of the country's total exports.
The main items shipped from the city were rice, seafood,
pepper, vegetables and fruits, textiles and garments, furniture, and wooden
products, according to the People's Committee.
Manufactured and processed goods accounted for nearly 70 per
cent of the shipments, and forest and farm produce and seafood accounted for
22 per cent.
Last year, 23 of the country's 63 cities and provinces
achieved exports of over $1 billion, five more than in 2013.
Bac Ninh remained the second largest exporter at $21.07
billion, though down by nearly $4 billion.
With Samsung shifting its production facilities from Bac Ninh
to Thai Nguyen, the latter's exports shot up to $7.83 billion from only $246
million in 2013.
Vinatex to make more materials in bid to reduce use of imports
The Viet Nam National Textile and Garment Group (Vinatex) will
invest most of its capital in material production projects in a move to
reduce dependence on imports.
Vinatex General Director Le Tien Truong said yesterday that
Vinatex is investing in 51 projects, 29 of which are of yarn and knitting
production.
This year, Vinatex is set to produce more than 100 million
metres of clothing, which is expected to increase to 300 million metres in
2016, when a number of new yarn and knitting production projects will become
operational.
Earlier, Vinatex had to import roughly 37 per cent of its
materials required for production.
Truong said after equitisation, Vinatex will operate as a
joint-stock company from February 1, and the firm will offer shares in 2017.
The textile and garment sector is expected to benefit from
several free-trade agreements (FTAs) that are likely to take effect, and it
aims to export goods worth $28 billion to $28.5 billion in 2015.
Owing to the advantages accruing from the FTAs, the textile
industry could double production in 10 years. However, textile enterprises
need to be well-prepared to seize the opportunity, especially to increase the
domestic material production.
Besides the 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP)
agreement, which includes the United States and Japan, Viet Nam has either
signed or in the final stages of negotiations for the FTA with the European
Union, South Korea and the Customs Union of Belarus, Kazakhstan and Russia.
Denmark firms see potential in VN
Danish businesses are eager to collaborate with Vietnamese
companies in the food, climate and energy sectors, Mogens Jensen, the Danish
Minister for Trade and Development Cooperation, said yesterday.
The minister made the statement while speaking at the
Danish–Vietnamese Business Seminar in Ha Noi.
A delegation of 40 businessmen from the aforementioned sectors
is accompanying the Danish minister and is interested in stepping up
cooperation with Vietnamese companies during the working visit that will last
from Monday to Thursday this week.
The main purpose of the visit is to build a positive
partnership and strong commercial relations between
The bilateral trade between
Out of that figure,
Meanwhile,
Currently, more than 130 Danish companies are doing business
in the country. Their main focus is the following sectors: furniture and
textiles, energy efficiency and environment (clean technology), information,
communication and technology (ICT), along with electronics and software,
transport and logistics (maritime), food and food safety, and health.
During the 2014 to 2015 period,
Thomas Bustrup, Deputy Director General of the Confederation
of Danish Industry, spoke highly of his country's close cooperation with
The export turnover of
Three contracts were also signed during the seminar, including
a memorandum of understanding (MoU) on further cooperation in the field of
oil and gas processing between Danish Haldor Topsoe and Petro Vietnam (PVN).
A contract for the sale of pig housing equipment between
Danish Vissing AgroA/S and Vietnamese Sun Group and another for the sale of
breeding pigs between Danish Danbred and Vietnamese Dabaco Group were also
signed.
Restructuring programme lags behind schedule at State firms
The restructuring of State-owned enterprises (SOEs) has
progressed slowly since it began in 2011, leaving significant tasks to
complete by the end of 2015.
According to the Steering Committee for Business Renovation
and Development, 143 SOEs were equitised in 2014, well below the set target
of 200, and 432 were subjected to restructuring in the 2014-15 period.
The Government raised the total number of SOEs requiring
equitisation to 532 in Decision 37/2014/QD-TTg on June 18.
While restructuring was initially rapid, the pace has since
slowed dramatically, said Tran Dinh Thien, director of the Vietnam Institute
of Economics.
Deputy Head of the Finance Ministry's Department of
Entrepreneurial Finance Dang Quyet Tien blamed the slowdown on out-of-date
policies and hesitation on the part of ministry leaders and business
executives, as well as impacts on
However, Finance Minister Dinh Tien Dung emphasised that the
programme needed to be implemented differently to make a real breakthrough.
It was necessary to raise awareness of the role of State-run
businesses in
The Finance Ministry plans to expand SOE restructuring across
sectors and business areas as part of efforts to generate a fair playing
ground for all businesses.
The ministry has also asked other ministries, localities and
businesses to continue reviewing and supplementing the list of enterprises
needing restructuring in accordance with the Government's Decision
37/2014/QD-TTg, while developing specific measures to complete restructuring
by 2015.
Trade with
Bilateral trade between
The online newspaper quoted data from the Brazilian Ministry
of Development, Industry and Foreign Trade as saying that during the period
Meanwhile, its imports from the South American country
recorded an annual surge of 33.6 per cent to more than $1.6 billion,
including agricultural goods, raw material for footwear production and
spices.
The surge in Viet Nam-Brazil bilateral trade was recorded
despite the fact that
The Vietnamese Trade Office in
The office urged Vietnamese enterprises to immediately take
full advantage of opportunities in
According to them, top priority should be given to growing
trade promotion and showcasing products at international trade fairs and
exhibitions, especially at the Sao Paulo Economic Centre.
This will enable the companies to penetrate further into this
lucrative market, establish partnerships and gain access to other markets in
In 2013, two-way trade jumped 42.3 per cent year-on-year to a
record $2.33 billion. This enabled
Steel giant reports 27% revenue growth
Giant steel maker Hoa Sen Group has reported a 27 per cent
jump in revenue in 2013-14.
At its annual shareholders' meeting in
Though the profit figure was just 71 per cent of the previous
year's, HSG chairman Le Phuoc Vu called it a "very successful"
result because the company had faced many difficulties like falling steel
prices, devaluation of some importers' currencies, fake steel products, and
anti-dumping issues.
In 2014-15 – which started on October 1 — HSG is targeting the
domestic market by strengthening its distribution system, opening 50 more
branches across the country.
It targets net profit of VND450 billion on sales of VND16.5
trillion.
Maybank Kim Eng Securities hikes capital
Maybank Kim Eng Securities Limited Company has increased its
chartered capital to VND829.1 billion (US$38.84 million) from VND615 billion
to fund expansion and improvement of its services.
This is the third capital hike by the Malaysian company, which
is fully owned by Maybank, since it came to
Nguyen Hoang Thien, its CEO, said the increase in capital is
an important step for the company to achieve its vision of becoming the
leading securities company in
Minister urges nation to ramp up construction
Minister of Transport Dinh La Thang said yesterday that his
sector would strive to complete 115 infrastructure projects and start 54 new
projects this year.
Speaking at an online conference with 63 provinces and cities
nationwide to review work of 2014 and set targets for 2015, Thang urged all
sectors and localities to speed up disbursement and construction for key
projects so that 46 projects could be started or completed within the first
quarter.
These projects include the upgrading and expansion of the
Regarding development investment projects, Thang said that the
sector would strive to finish all plans and disburse all the assigned capital
of over VND86.6 trillion (US$4.1 billion), of which more than VND37.7
trillion (nearly $1.8 billion) come from State bonds while the remainder is
from outside the State budget.
"First of all, we will focus on the management of
transport fees and vehicle weight to ensure a healthy environment for
transport enterprises to operate their business," Thang stressed.
He asked transport enterprises to make plans to serve
passengers during Tet and co-operate with other sectors to prevent accidents,
stressing that enterprises must prepare enough buses for people to travel
before, during and after Tet.
The transport sector will also speed up equitisation for its
State-owned companies, of which 14 will be completed this year and 29 others
will start the process.
Shipbuilding Corporation speeds up restructuring subsidiaries
The State-run Shipbuilding Industry Corporation (SBIC) is to
restructure 152 subsidiaries in 2015, General Director Vu Anh Tuan revealed
at a conference setting the year’s tasks on January 16.
The corporation will sell stakes in 28 companies and dissolve
43 others while another 39 will be filed for bankruptcy in the year, he
noted.
Last year, SBIC completed the restructuring of 42
subsidiaries, bringing the total number of its restructured firms to 100 so
far.
As much as 135 million USD of foreign debt and 16.61 trillion
VND (790.95 million USD) of domestic debt was also restructured, and SBIC is
still working on it.
The corporation generated nearly 5.72 trillion VND (272.38
million USD) in production value in 2014, about 4.74 trillion VND (225.71
million USD) of which coming from shipbuilding and repair services.
Its total revenue from both core and non-core activities was
estimated at 7.64 trillion VND (363.8 million USD) last year, representing
128.96 percent of the set target.
SBIC expects to earn nearly 7.22 trillion VND (343.8 million
USD) in 2015, accounting for 94.46 percent of the 2014 figure, with 4.72
trillion VND from shipbuilding and 375 billion VND from repair activities.
State-owned enterprise restructuring is part of the economic
restructuring scheme stated in the National Assembly’s Resolution
No.10/2011/QH13 on the socio-economic development plan for 2011 to 2015.
Public investment and the banking system are also being restructured.
Among 479 SOEs subject to the reorganisation in 2014 and 2015,
143 had been equitised by December 25, 2014, while 14 others were merged,
three dissolved, three sold, and three filed for bankruptcy, according to the
Steering Committee for Business Renovation and Development.-
The Vietnam Food Association (VFA) has promised that it will
buy all commodity rice from farmers this year regardless of gloomy export
prospects.
According to VFA Chairman Nguyen Hung Linh,
He cited stiff competition from major rice exporters such as
In addition, local companies have been hindered by financial
difficulties, poor cultivation planning, and out-dated technology.
Linh predicted that the world rice demand is likely to rise or
at least remain the same as 2014 so Vietnamese exporters should actively seek
ways to win contracts and set up their firm footholds in foreign markets.
Vietnam-Argentina trade records 1.92 billion USD in 2014
Trade turnover between
Trade turnover between the two nations continues its rising
trend despite
New law drafted to prop up private sector
The Ministry of Planning and Investment is drafting a new law
intended to guarantee breakthrough development in the private sector, said
Minister Bui Quang Vinh.
Vinh told reporters in
“The purpose of the proposed law is to create the best
environment for the private sector in
According to Vinh, though the enterprise and investment laws
passed by the National Assembly last year have helped create a favorable
business environment, they are not supportive enough for the struggling
private sector.
Vinh said the proposed law would build the most favorable
playing field for business start-ups and people to translate their business
ideas into reality. Besides, the forthcoming law is expected to include
regulations prioritizing the establishment of funds designed to give soft
long-term loans to private enterprises.
In addition, the Government will provide mechanisms help young
enterprises seek markets, build brands and apply modern technology.
The ministry is running a business incubator and a SME
supporting fund but all are still in their infancy, Vinh said. “We want to build
such a foundation in the draft law to support private enterprises.”
The private sector is still grappling with challenges as
67,823 enterprises were dissolved or suspended last year, according to the
General Statistics Office. Over 230,000 enterprises have been shut down in
the past four years.
This is a big concern for Vinh. “I think we haven’t done a
good job to develop the private sector,” he said.
“We need to care more about the development of the domestic
business community, especially private enterprises. I want to repeat that
private firms must be the key driving force for the country’s development.”
He asked, “Why can’t private firms get the same privileged
treatment as State-owned enterprises?”
Therefore, according to Vinh, the Government needs to offer
more policy incentives for enterprises to help them ride out difficulties and
develop, especially SMEs and private companies.
Petroleum giants mull pumping cuts
Vietnam National Oil and Gas Group (PVN) and Vietnam-Russia
petroleum joint venture Vietsovpetro are pondering plans to reduce their
pumping at a number of oil fields with high production cost to avoid losses
if crude oil prices slide further on global markets.
PVN chairman Nguyen Xuan Son said the group is keeping a close
eye on the world’s crude oil prices and market developments, and calculating
the production cost and business efficiency of crude extractions in every
block of the fields.
Currently, the average exploitation cost of PVN is US$30-37
per barrel depending on oil fields.
Previously, when the world’s crude oil prices fell to under
US$60 per barrel, PVN had plans to reduce output at several fields with high
production cost.
The group now has around four fields with high production cost
but low output, Son told a recent media briefing.
Most of the high-cost oil fields previously belonged to
foreign investors, who had left after having extracted almost all crude, and
PVN had jumped in to pump the remainder, he said.
However, PVN does not plan sharp crude and gas output cuts in
2015. The group plans to extract 16.8 million tons of oil and 9.8 billion
cubic meters of gas, year-on-year falls of 500,000 tons and 400 million cubic
meters respectively.
In its report on last year’s business performance and the plan
for this year, PVN expected revenue of more than VND515 trillion (over US$24
billion) if the global crude oil price is US$60 per barrel, well below the
VND745.5 trillion it earned last year, when the export price of crude averaged
US$113 per barrel.
The shrinking revenue of PVN will also affect the State budget
collections. Given the crude oil price of US$60 per barrel this year, the
group could contribute VND104.2 trillion to the State budget, falling by
VND74 trillion against last year.
Tu Thanh Nghia, general director of Vietsovpetro, was quoted
by Thanh Nien as saying that the joint venture would consider halting
operations of several oilrigs and suspend exploration projects if the global
crude oil prices keep falling to the levels where it cannot break even.
Firm warns against imposters in home sale
Dai Quang Minh Real Estate Investment Company warned on
January 13 that many websites have been found to be imposters as they have
claimed themselves as sales agents of the company to sell apartments in
HCMC’s District 2.
Some of the fraudulent agents have asked customers to place
deposits for units at the Sala urban area which Dai Quang Minh is developing
in Thu Thiem New Urban Area.
Dai Quang Minh’s general director Tran Ba Duong said visitors
were welcomed in at the gate at 10 Mai Chi Tho Street in District 2 from 8
a.m. to 9 p.m. every day to inspect the Sala project.
The company is completing model apartments, townhouses and
villas in the first phase of the project, Duong said. He stressed the company
has neither announced housing prices nor sold any products at Sala, and has
picked no individuals and organizations as sales agents for the project.
However, many websites have used the name of Dai Quang Minh to
put Sala homes on sale and have provided false information about the project
and fake hotline numbers. Some websites have even called themselves official
distributors of Dai Quang Minh and are ready to take deposits for apartments.
Dai Quang Minh has only posted information about itself and
Sala on www.khudothisala.vn and www.dqmcorp.vn. The sites at skyreal.com.vn,
khudothisala.org, khudothisalathuthiem.net, salaquan2.com, salathuthiem.org
and khudothisala.info illegally use photos and information related to Sala,
thus affecting the prestige of Dai Quang Minh, the company said.
Dai Quang Minh is involved in major infrastructure projects in
the Thu Thiem New Urban Area, including four main roads, the central square
and riverside park, and Thu Thiem 2 Bridge.
The company has four founding shareholders, with Truong Hai
Auto Corporation (Thaco) holding a 45% stake, Mai Linh Investment Joint Stock
Company 37.5%, and the company’s chairman Tran Dang Khoa and Invencon
Investment Advice and International Trading Joint Stock Company the remaining
17.5%.
The Vietnam Cassava Association (VCA) organised a conference
in southern Tay Ninh province to seek to reap higher output for cassava,
which is viewed as one of the staples helping eliminate hunger in the
country.
Jointly hosted by the Tay Ninh provincial People’s Committee,
the January 15 event brought together representatives from
Mainly shipped to
Around 3 million tonnes of the products are exported every
year, bringing home more than 1.3 billion USD.
According to VCA,
Tay Ninh province ranks first in terms of average yield and
second in cultivation area.
It has over 50,000 hectares grown with cassava with per-ha
yield of 31.7 tonnes.
It is now home to 45 out of 88 cassava starch factories across
the country. These plants boast a combined capacity of 750,000 tonnes of
starch per year.
Bui Cong Ngoc, a local farmer, said after years of growing low
yield crops, his family gave cassava a try and soon discovered its economic
efficiency. He has been growing cassava since then and 10 years after, he
owns 10 hectares of cassava with an average output of 50 tonnes per hectare.
Chairman of the VCA Nguyen Van Lang expressed his belief that
cassava will become one of the staples helping reduce poverty in
There is an urgent need to apply advanced technology and adopt
improved varieties into cultivation in order to boost the crop output and
increase competitiveness, he added.
The shift from cultivating rice to higher-value crops and
livestock has significantly increased
The GDP of agriculture, forestry and fisheries increased an
average of 5.8 per cent a year between 2011 and 2014, compared to the
national rate of about 3 per cent, said Le Thanh Liem, deputy chairman of the
municipal People's Committee.
The increase was due to the restructuring of the city's
agricultural sector, which began in the 2000s, he said.
In the 1990s, due to rapid urbanisation, GDP of agriculture
increased by about 1 per cent a year.
In 2004, the municipal People's Committee approved a programme
of developing flowers, ornamental trees and livestock to increase
agricultural value.
Under the programme, farmers whose rice fields had a yield of
less than two tonnes per ha a rice crop were encouraged to switch to other
higher-value crops like safe vegetables, orchids, milk cows and ornamental
fish.
The city farmers had an average annual profit of VND325
million (US$15,400) per ha last year, up 15.2 per cent against 2013,
according to the municipal People's Committee.
Last year, farmers who grew safe vegetables had an annual
profit of VND400 million ($19,000) per ha and those who bred milk cows had an
annual profit of VND100 million ($4,700) for raising 20 milk cows.
The city has exported plant seeds for cultivating, vegetables,
flowers, ornamental fish and crocodiles to many countries and territories,
including the
It exported 415 tonnes of plant seeds for cultivating, 1,000
tonnes of vegetables, 11 million ornamental fish, nearly 16,000 crocodiles
and 1,500 crocodile skins last year. The seed exports include corn,
vegetables, flowers and fruit.
To encourage farmers switching to urban agriculture, the city
has decided to provide soft loans for farmers.
Nguyen Thi Tien, 45, who lives in Cu Chi District's An Phu
Commune, said in 2008 she received a soft bank loan worth VND90 million
($4,200) to buy four milk cows for breeding.
In 2013, she was provided another soft bank loan worth VND300
million ($14,280) under a city Decision 13 to buy more cows. She now has 30
cows, including 15 milk cows which are producing about 200 litres of milk a
day.
"My family earns a profit of about VND48 million ($2,280)
a month," she said.
Before 2005, Tien's family made a living by breeding ducks but
she had to destroy more than 1,000 ducks of bird flu in 2005.
She began working in a garment company but her income as a
sewer was too low to support her family.
The city's Decision 13 issued in 2013 to encourage urban
agriculture in 2013-15 helped provided soft loans to more than 6,500 farmers.
Because of Decision 13, many farmers in Can Gio District, one
of the city's key districts in developing safe vegetables, flowers and
ornamental fish, received loans to shift from planting rice to cultivating
shrimp, fish and other crops.
Besides being a large consumer of flowers,
While the city's safe vegetables, fresh milk and black tiger
shrimp have had stable domestic outlets, local outlets for the city's orchids
have not been stable because many ornamental creature shops are small and
owned by individuals.
In 2010, the HCM City Ornamental Creature Association asked
the municipal People's Committee to develop a trade and services network for
ornamental plants and fish.
In the initial phase, the city would set up three ornamental
creature centres in suitable areas and an ornamental creature retail system
in districts where there is a large population, according to the association.
The municipal People's Committee has recently assigned Saigon
Trading Group (SATRA) to work with the Centre for the Promotion of Imports
from developing countries (an agency of the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign
Affairs), and FloraHolland, which specialises in organising flower exchange
floors in the Netherlands, to set up a transaction floor for flowers and
ornamental fish at the Binh Dien wholesale agriculture market in District 8.
The city has had about 2,130ha of flowers and ornamental trees
last year, up 4.9 per cent against 2013.
The head of the HCM City Department of Information and
Communications has hailed the city's semi-conductor industry development
programme for its accomplishments since being begun two years ago.
Speaking at a conference held to mark its second anniversary
in
The programme, entrusted to the Viet Nam National
University-HCM City's Integrated Circuit Design Research and Education Centre
(ICDREC), comprises of seven components including human resource training;
incubating IC businesses; and building and running a design centre and a chip
manufacturing plant.
Director of ICDREC, Ngo Duc Hoang, said products based on
Vietnamese chips that have been commercialised include SG-8V1 and KIT DE-8V1
chips, container electric locks, itinerary surveillance devices, electronic
meters, DCM (data collection modems), and RFID (radio frequency
identification) management systems.
The conference also mapped out plans for the immediate future,
especially for the development of programmes related to chip-based products
and Lab-to-Fab and development of micro-electro-mechanical systems.
"These projects aim to create an ‘ecosystem' for the
According to the ICDREC, over 20 billion chips were consumed
in
Hy said the programme, to run until 2020, was ratified by the
city People's Committee in 2012.
The conference was held by the HCM City Steering Committee for
Semi-conductor Industry Development and the Department of Information and
Telecommunications.
Forestry augments household earnings
Engaging in forestry has helped hundreds of thousands of poor
farmer families in mountainous areas boos their annual incomes by 25 per
cent, an official says.
"Each household could earn an average of VND15 -17
million (US$720-810) a year from selling forestry products harvested from the
land lent to them by the government or the State-owned forestry corporations,
" Pham Van Hanh, an official with the Foresty Production Management
Department under the Viet Nam Administration of Forestry, said on Thursday.
He was speaking at a four-day meeting on successful forestry
business models held in Ha Noi.
The meeting, organised by the Viet Nam Farmers' Association
Central Committee (VNFACC), has attracted the participation of 17 member
countries of the Forest Connect Programme including
According to a report on national land usage prepared by the
General Department of Land Administration in 2010, forest land allotted to
households and individuals totalled 4.2 million hectares, accounting for
about 35.5 per cent of the nation's forest coverage.
The policy of lending forest land to promote household
business in recent years played a major role in increasing the forestry
sector's productivity and contributed to economic growth, Hanh said.
Statistics compiled by the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural
Development show that the output of plantations doubled from 6 cu m in 2009
to 16 cu m last year while wood and forestry product exports reached US$6.3
billion, an increase of 14 per cent over 2013.
"Forestry household has become an effective means to
fight poverty by establishing a closer connection between farmers and
forests; and, at the same time, promoting environmental protection and
climate change adaptation," said Vu Le Y Voan, Deputy Head of the
VNFACC's International Co-operation Department.
Though forestry households had proven successful, farmers
still faced many hurdles, the meeting heard.
Their small-scale production and lack of skills in negotiating
product prices with dealers prevented them from earning higher profits.
And though productivity in the forestry sector had improved,
it was considerably lower than that of neighbouring countries, Hanh said.
The country's productivity was about half of the Phillipines,
40 percent of
"Many farmers are not able to wait for the trees to reach
their full growth in ten years. In order to support their families, they
chose to harvest when the trees are just five or six years old," Hanh
explained.
"Consequently, the wood quality is not high, leading to
much lower prices, and the farmers end up hurting themselves," he said.
The Forest Connect Programme, which started in 2007, has
supported enterprises in15 countries. It has also established online links
between more than 1,000 individuals and organisations in 94 countries.
The programme is jointly organised by the International
Institute for Environment and Development (IIED), the
Banks ramp up capital in competitive push
Many banks are trying to boost their charter capital to
consolidate their competitiveness, reported Dau tu (Viet Nam Investment
Review).
Nam A Bank General Director Tran Ngo Phuc Vu had said earlier
this month that the State Bank of Viet Nam (SBV) permitted his bank to ramp
up its charter capital from VND3 trillion to VND4 trillion (from US$142.86
million to $190.48 million).
Vu added that the bank would have implemented the capital
increase during the fourth quarter of last year, in accordance with a plan
adopted at its 2014 shareholder meeting, but it had just received official
permission for dealing with procedures and waiting for licences from relevant
agencies "took time."
He further said the bank would issue shares to raise capital
and that this process was expected to be completed in the first quarter of
this year. It would also list shares on the stock market to enhance its
financial capacity to catch up with market developments.
Sai Gon Commercial Bank's (SCB's) bid to raise equity by VND2
trillion ($95.24 million) to more than VND14.29 trillion ($680.48 million) is
also underway, after the SBV approved the scheme late last year. The bank
will increase capital by offering investors 200 million shares through
put-through transactions.
SCB General Director Vo Tan Hoang Van said the bank was
finalising a plan that would help it improve its financial capacity in the
context of its restructuring process.
Of the total amount to be added, the bank would use VND250
billion for investments and capital contribution and VND255 billion for
information technology upgrades. It would also spend VND45 billion on office
upgrades, and reserve VND1.45 trillion as additional business capital.
The Orient Commercial Bank has also issued about 31.3 million
additional shares, with funds extracted from undistributed profits and equity
supplement reserves, to begin a capital increase plan approved by the SBV
late last year.
This bank will raise its charter capital from VND3.23 trillion
to VND4 trillion (from $153.81 million to $190.48 million), as per a decision
taken at its shareholder meeting in 2014.
However, many other banks are yet to implement their capital
increase plans, due to obstacles resulting from stock declines and investors'
shrinking interest in the face of an on-going banking restructuring process.
These include the VietABank, SaigonBank, BaoViet Bank and DongA Bank.
In April 2014, the DongA Bank had to cancel a plan to raise
capital from VND5 trillion to VND6 trillion (from $238.10 million to $285.71
million) as investors had failed to contribute as much money as they had
committed before.
Business Development Institute Director Le Xuan Nghia said
continuing banking reforms would narrow the spectrum of banks operating in
the banking system, where only institutions that are healthy enough and have
a solid financial capacity will be able to exist.
Banks raising capital are among measures that would help them
ensure competitiveness in the coming months in this era of "fierce
competition," he said, noting that it was not easy for small banks to do
so, considering that market conditions remain tough.
Many banks would have to choose mergers and acquisitions to
survive, he added.
HCM City to host Viet Nam-India Business Forum
The industry and trade ministry and the Indian Embassy in
The forum will attract 25 Indian businesses from different
sectors, including garment and textiles, leather and shoes, machinery and
pharmacy, besides banking.
The forum is part of the framework of the second conference of
the Viet Nam-India Commerce Sub-committee.
Source :
VEF/VNA/VNS/VOV/SGT/SGGP/Dantri/VIR
|
Thứ Ba, 20 tháng 1, 2015
Đăng ký:
Đăng Nhận xét (Atom)
Không có nhận xét nào:
Đăng nhận xét