Many major changes in investment law

The National Assembly passed a law amending four laws on investment. Photo: National Assembly

Special investment procedures come true

On the afternoon of November 29, with 444/446 delegates in favor, the National Assembly passed the Law amending and supplementing a number of articles of the Law on Planning, the Law on Investment, the Law on Investment under the public-private partnership model (PPP Law) and the Law on Bidding, effective from January 15, 2025.

The outstanding new point of amending these laws is not only to remove practical obstacles, but also to demonstrate strong decentralization and delegation of power, and the consistent spirit in the law-making work at the 8th Session of the 15th National Assembly.

Accordingly, in the field of planning, the Law decentralizes power to the Government to approve the policy of adjusting the national marine spatial planning and national land use planning according to a shortened order and procedure to promptly meet urgent requirements arising from practice.

The Government is also assigned to detail the principles, bases, dossiers, and procedures for adjusting planning according to the shortened procedures to ensure flexibility and suitability with reality. The Government will detail the consultation process during the process of adjusting planning according to the shortened procedures.

At the same time, to solve difficulties in implementing urgent projects and tasks that change some contents of the planning, including the fields of electricity and natural resources and environment, the Law has been supplemented with provisions on the basis for adjusting planning according to the shortened procedures for urgent and urgent projects according to the Government's regulations.

The Law also decentralizes the Minister and Chairman of the Provincial People's Committee to approve the adjustment of national sectoral planning and provincial planning according to the shortened procedures, and adds the content of decentralization to ministries and ministerial-level agencies to issue plans to implement national sectoral planning to ensure flexibility in organizing the implementation of planning.

Regarding the amendment of the Investment Law, the Law stipulates that the Government establishes an Investment Support Fund from additional corporate income tax revenue according to regulations on preventing erosion of the global tax base and other legal sources to stabilize the investment environment, encourage and attract strategic investors, multinational corporations and support domestic enterprises in a number of areas that need investment incentives.

In the process of amending this law, the issue that many delegates are interested in is the regulation on special investment procedures for investment projects in the fields of innovation, semiconductor industry, high technology in industrial parks, export processing zones, high-tech zones and economic zones in the direction of shifting from "pre-inspection" to "post-inspection".

Minister of Planning and Investment Nguyen Chi Dung has repeatedly emphasized that the issuance of this regulation is very necessary in the context of increasingly fierce competition to attract foreign direct investment (FDI), a sharp decline in foreign investment flows worldwide, and an increasing protectionist trend. Countries are constantly innovating to compete to attract investment, if Vietnam stands still, it will lose its opportunity. Reporting to the National Assembly before the approval, Chairman of the Economic Committee Vu Hong Thanh said that this is a new policy to attract investment in priority areas such as innovation and high technology. In the spirit of innovation in law-making, the Draft Law has been revised in the direction of simplifying detailed contents on documents and procedures, retaining only necessary principles and specific contents, ensuring that the principles in the Draft Law submitted to the National Assembly do not change. At the same time, taking into account the opinions of delegates, the Draft Law has added the concentrated information technology zone and free trade zone to the areas where special investment procedures are applied, contributing to synchronizing policies, creating a favorable foundation for attracting investment and developing these areas. To ensure feasibility and flexibility in operation, the Government is assigned to specify this in detail, including the content on the project's conformity with relevant planning.

Regarding the amendment of the PPP Law, Mr. Thanh stated that in order to create a legal basis for implementing the BT contract mechanism, taking into account the opinions of delegates, the Draft Law has been revised in the direction of only stipulating the basic principles on the payment mechanism for investors for 3 forms, including payment by land fund, payment by state budget and no payment required. At the same time, the provision assigning the Government to specify the BT contract mechanism in detail for the above payment forms is added.

Regarding the bidding field, Mr. Thanh said that, taking into account the opinions of National Assembly deputies, the Draft Law has been revised to increase the limit on designated bidding from 100 million VND to 300 million VND for bidding packages under the procurement budget that do not form a project, and at the same time does not distinguish the limit on designated bidding between bidding packages using regular expenditure capital and public investment capital.

Major changes in the authority of deciding on investment policies

Also approved by the National Assembly with a very high rate (441/448 delegates participating), the revised Law on Public Investment demonstrates strong decentralization and delegation of power.

Accordingly, the Law increases the scale of public investment capital for important national projects to 30,000 billion VND (three times higher than the current level).

"This is to decentralize more strongly in public investment management, ensuring stability in implementing the Law", emphasized Chairman of the Finance - Budget Committee Le Quang Manh.

Regarding the authority to decide on investment policies for group B and group C projects, during the discussion, many opinions said that decentralizing the authority to decide on investment policies for projects from the People's Council to the People's Committee is a major change, and it is necessary to study and assess the impact carefully.

Agreeing with the delegates that this is a major change, but with the spirit of promoting decentralization and delegation of power in innovating the thinking of law-making, the National Assembly Standing Committee agreed with the Government's proposal. The explanation of this content before the National Assembly pressed the button also convinced the delegates.

Another new content is the Law on decentralization of authority to adjust the medium-term public investment plan of central budget capital between ministries, central and local agencies from the National Assembly Standing Committee to the Prime Minister.

During the discussion, some delegates suggested considering this provision. However, according to the Chairman of the Finance and Budget Committee Le Quang Manh, with the spirit of innovation, in order to increase flexibility in the management and implementation of the medium-term public investment plan, this provision is also consistent with the regulation that the list of medium-term public investment plan projects is only a "projected" list, the adjustment of the medium-term public investment plan will be carried out more frequently to suit the practical situation.

“The draft Law, after being received and revised, ensures quality according to the requirements and wishes of the National Assembly deputies. The discussion process at the National Assembly shows that the contents are clear and closely follow the spirit of innovation in law-making. The promulgation of the Law on Public Investment at this session and its effective date from January 1, 2025 will create a synchronous legal basis for ministries, central and local agencies to promptly deploy and apply immediately in 2025 to deploy new regulations in preparing to develop and implement the medium-term public investment plan for the period 2026 - 2030,” Mr. Manh responded to some opinions of deputies who were still concerned about the time of passing the Law./.