Government bond disbursement improves

Vietnam has disbursed 47.3 trillion VND (2.25 billion USD) of capital raised via Government bond sales as of early December, completing 78 percent of the disbursement plan of the year, the State Treasury's statistics show.

The capital source was designed to finance several sectors, including transportation, urgent irrigation works, health care service projects, education and training in poor areas and flood regions, and other projects to be finalised in 2011 and 2012.
Vietnam has disbursed 47.3 trillion VND (2.25 billion USD) of capitalraised via Government bond sales as of early December, completing 78percent of the disbursement plan of the year, the State Treasury'sstatistics show.

The capital source was designed tofinance several sectors, including transportation, urgent irrigationworks, health care service projects, education and training in poorareas and flood regions, and other projects to be finalised in 2011 and2012.

The ministries of finance, and planning andinvestment, and the National Assembly's Economic Committee saw the 47.3trillion VND volume the highest figure ever achieved.

Disbursement had been targeted at 56 trillion VND (2.67 billion USD),of which 20.2 trillion VND (961.9 million USD) would be disbursed at thecentral level and another 35.8 trillion VND (1.7 billion USD) local andmunicipal bonds.

"In order to meet the year'starget, about 11.2 trillion VND (533.3 million USD) worth of bonds wouldhave to have been disbursed in the single month of December 2010, equalto about 20 percent of the target for the whole year. That wouldn't beeasy to do," said National Assembly Finance and Budget Committeechairman Phung Quoc Hien.

Do Ngoc Quynh, generalsecretary of the Vietnam Bond Market Association, said: "Missing thetarget in Government bond fund disbursement is a serious problem forVietnam . However, what the National Assembly is thinking about now isthe quality and effectiveness of disbursement."

TheNational Assembly Finance and Budget Committee earlier this monthreported that some provinces had disbursed Government bond proceeds tothe wrong projects, the wrong sectors, or to unapproved projects.

The National Assembly Standing Committee and the Finance and BudgetCommittee refused the Government's proposal to add 40 projects to theGovernment-bond funded project list.

Hien'scommittee has found that initial capital plans for Government-bondfunded projects during 2003-10 were just 246.5 trillion VND (11.7billion USD), but the actual figure has soared 226 percent to nearly558.7 trillion VND (26.6 billion USD) during the period.

"Total investment has increased too sharply against the State'scapacity to balance the budget, badly affecting the nation's capacity toborrow and to service debt," said Hien.

In 2010,Vietnam raised about 70 trillion VND (3.3 billion USD) in Governmentbond sales, according to the Vietnam Bond Market Association.

To lower the nation's public debt burden, which rose to 57 per cent ofgross domestic product this past year, the National Assembly hasalready approved a Government plan to raise only 45 trillion VND (2.14billion USD) this year, with top priority for bond proceeds to be givento transportation and water resource projects.

TheStanding Committee late last week also urged strong measures toeliminate ineffective projects and improve the effectiveness of publicinvestment./.

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