Prime Minister directs to remove difficulties in norms, unit prices, and construction materials for traffic works

Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh has just signed and issued Official Dispatch No. 02/CD-TTg directing to focus on removing difficulties and obstacles related to construction norms and unit prices; exploiting and supplying construction materials for key and important national traffic projects and works.

Telegrams sent to the Ministers of Construction, Transport, Natural Resources and Environment; Chairmen of People's Committees of provinces and centrally run cities.

The telegram stated: In recent times, the Prime Minister has issued many instructions on the implementation of tasks and solutions to accelerate the progress of investment and construction projects in general, especially key and important national transport projects and works. The synchronous implementation of solutions has created positive changes, removing difficulties and obstacles in the implementation of investment and construction projects. The Ministry of Transport, the Ministry of Construction, and the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment have proactively urged and guided the removal of difficulties and obstacles in the implementation of investment and construction projects for ministries, branches and localities.

In addition to the achieved results, in reality there are still some difficulties and problems related to the management of construction investment costs, management of construction norms and prices, and management of common construction materials for construction investment projects, especially transportation projects across the country.

To accelerate the progress of construction investment projects, especially traffic projects and works, contributing to the completion of socio-economic development goals, the Prime Minister requested the Minister of Construction to direct relevant units to study, review, amend, supplement and adjust according to their authority or advise competent authorities to amend and supplement legal documents related to the management of construction investment costs to ensure consistency with reality and feasibility in implementation, and report to the Prime Minister on the implementation status in March 2024.

Urgently review, adjust and supplement the norms that have been issued by the Ministry of Construction under its authority but are not suitable or are still lacking, report to the Prime Minister on the implementation results in April 2024; proactively coordinate with ministries managing specialized construction works and localities to organize the development of specific estimate norms for the specialized sector and localities with new construction technology, construction conditions, and construction materials or those not yet included in the current norm system.

At the same time, actively guide and urge localities to announce construction price indexes, construction material prices (quarterly or earlier if necessary), construction labor unit prices (annually or earlier if necessary) to ensure timeliness, completeness, consistency with market prices, and compliance with legal regulations; inspect the implementation status in localities with key traffic construction projects.

The Minister of Transport directs and organizes the determination of the list and plans to review the estimated norms for specific construction works of the industry, and at the same time organizes the development of estimated norms under the authority of the Ministry of Transport and sends them to the Ministry of Construction for comments before promulgation.

The Ministry directs investors/Project Management Boards to strictly establish, determine, manage, and decide on the use of adjusted cost estimates and new cost estimates for projects according to their authority, as a basis for determining construction prices as prescribed in Decree 10/2021/ND-CP of the Government.

At the same time, direct investors to review construction material survey records of projects, and if necessary, promptly supplement and adjust to ensure sufficient sources of filling materials for project needs according to regulations; coordinate with the Ministry of Construction to review and complete construction norms to ensure they are suitable for the characteristics of the transport sector.

The Minister of Transport shall coordinate with the Ministries of Natural Resources and Environment and Agriculture and Rural Development to promptly handle, within their authority, or report to competent authorities to resolve difficulties and problems related to exploitation, supply of construction materials, conversion of forest use purposes, forest land, rice land, etc. during the implementation of transport projects.

Urgently complete and report to Deputy Prime Minister Tran Hong Ha on the results of the pilot use of sea sand as filling material for transport infrastructure projects before January 20, 2024, as a basis for granting exploitation licenses, proactively sourcing materials, and reducing dependence on river sand; urgently develop and promulgate the Highway Design Standards according to the direction of the Prime Minister in Official Dispatch No. 794/CD-TTg as a basis for planning, designing, investing in construction and managing the highway system and connecting intersections; complete in the first quarter of 2024.

The Minister of Natural Resources and Environment directed the review and enhancement of decentralization and delegation of authority; grouping of minerals in the process of drafting the Law on Geology and Minerals in the direction of separating the group of minerals used as filling materials to have separate regulations on the exploitation of filling materials to simplify the procedures and dossier components to the maximum extent, and submit to the Government in February 2024.

The Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment urgently guides localities to carry out procedures for exploiting sea sand that has been assessed for resources to promptly exploit to meet the demand for filling materials for expressway projects in the Mekong Delta region according to the specific mechanism prescribed in Article 4 of Resolution No. 106/2023/QH15 of the National Assembly on Piloting a number of specific policies on investment in road construction.

The Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment closely coordinates with localities to promptly guide and resolve difficulties in licensing mineral exploitation for filling materials, compensation, and resettlement support when the State reclaims land; and the conversion of forest land and rice land use purposes for construction investment projects serving the exploitation of minerals for common construction materials.

Chairmen of People's Committees of provinces and centrally run cities shall direct relevant agencies and units to promptly announce construction price indexes, construction material prices (quarterly or earlier if necessary), and construction labor unit prices (annually or earlier if necessary) to ensure completeness, consistency with market prices, and compliance with legal regulations; proactively coordinate with the Ministry of Construction to issue specific local norms.

Provinces and cities continue to review mineral mines for filling materials in the area, proactively coordinate with neighboring localities to plan and license mineral mines for filling materials to ensure sufficient materials according to the construction schedule for key traffic projects in the area; direct investors/project management boards to review construction material survey dossiers of traffic projects to promptly supplement and adjust to ensure sufficient sources and capacity of filling materials for project needs, especially projects in the Mekong Delta region.

The Chairmen of the People's Committees of provinces and cities direct competent agencies to coordinate with investors and contractors to negotiate with owners on land transfer and lease prices to ensure they are consistent with the compensation price levels prescribed by the State, to prevent speculation, price increases, and price pressure; to have sanctions to handle cases of intentional price increases, "price pressure", and land speculation in mining areas; to remove obstacles related to reforestation, conversion of forest use purposes, and conversion of forest land and rice land use purposes.

The Prime Minister assigned Deputy Prime Minister Tran Hong Ha to directly direct, inspect, urge and handle arising issues within his authority. In case of exceeding authority, report to the Prime Minister; the Government Office urges ministries, agencies and localities to perform the tasks assigned in this Official Dispatch.