Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh inspects operations and passenger service quality at Hanoi Railway Station. (Photo: Tran Hai)

In the past year, despite many difficulties, challenges, and complex global and regional situations, under the wise leadership of the Party, led by the late General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong and General Secretary To Lam, with coordination from the National Assembly, decisive direction from the government and prime minister, the involvement of the entire political system, ministries, localities, business community and people, and support from international friends, Vietnam has recorded great socio-economic achievements, with the highlight being the construction of key transport infrastructure systems, especially expressways.

Overcoming all weather challenges

Focusing on transport infrastructure development is the shortest path to opening new development spaces for the nation through increasing land value; reducing logistics costs; creating favourable travel conditions; enhancing competitiveness for goods; strongly attracting investment; expanding urban areas, industry, and services; creating jobs; and improving the livelihoods of the people.

Currently, Vietnam is actively implementing component projects of the eastern North-South Expressway and East-West Expressway in the Mekong Delta, Long Thanh International Airport, Terminal T3 of Tan Son Nhat International Airport, and so on. Notably, the Politburo agreed on the investment policy for the North-South high-speed railway project. This is an ambitious project with a total length of 1,541 kilometres, a total investment of over 67.3 billion USD, and a design speed of 350 kilometres per hour. Along with this mega-project, Vietnam is also actively studying three standard-gauge railway projects connecting to China, including the Lang Son-Hanoi, Mong Cai-Ha Long-Hai Phong, and Lao Cai-Hanoi-Hai Phong Lines; among these, construction of the Lao Cai-Hanoi-Hai Phong Line is expected to commence by the end of 2025.

During many site inspections and progress review meetings of key transport projects, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh consistently emphasised that 2025 is a year of many significant commemorative events for the country, therefore, we must strive to complete major projects early, befitting the nation’s entry into a new era. To achieve this, the prime minister required engineers and workers to overcome all difficulties, working day and night, surpassing all weather challenges, working through holidays, festivals and Tet to ensure project progress and quality.

The past year was also considered successful as Vietnam completed the construction of a 500kV power transmission line from Quang Trach (Quang Binh Province) to Pho Noi (Hung Yen Province), a landmark project completed in a record time of over 6 months, while such a project typically takes 3-4 years to complete. From this project, the prime minister highlighted the lesson that mobilising the combined strength of the entire political system and working together to support investors and contractors can accelerate progress.

Another model derived is that project investors and main contractors share feasible work with local contractors while utilising local resources and materials. Thanks to the government’s direction and local authorities’ active involvement, affected residents voluntarily relocated and gave land for the project without complaint. The success of this project needs to be spread to other key projects.

Phan Thiet - Dau Giay Expressway (Photo: Thien Vuong)

Strong decentralisation and delegation along with inspection and supervision

Implementing General Secretary To Lam’s directive at the recent 10th Plenum of the Party Central Committee regarding “local decisions, local implementation, local responsibility”, the prime minister has repeatedly reminded ministries and agencies not to “hoard work” but to focus on state management, planning, mechanisms and policies, while increasing delegation to lower levels and localities, along with strengthening inspection and supervision. The prime minister’s view is that capital from the central budget should only be put into key projects of transformative nature.

To facilitate the smooth implementation of key projects, the prime minister has chaired numerous meetings and demanded the resolution of all difficulties and obstacles in project implementation, especially institutional bottlenecks, as institutions are the “bottleneck of bottlenecks.”

The prime minister consistently called on authorities to put themselves in the position of investors and contractors to resolve issues with the spirit of “wherever there’s an obstacle, resolve it there” and “whichever level encounters the obstacle, that level is responsible for resolving it”, with the interests of the nation and people taking utmost priority. The prime minister underlined the spirit of valuing time, intellect and innovation for breakthroughs in the progress of key projects. Accordingly, implementation time must be shortened to reduce costs and energy consumption, while intellect must transcend normal patterns and surpass oneself.

With the spirit of the new spring, we strongly believe that the entire country will successfully complete all goals and tasks set by the 13th Party Congress Resolution, especially key transport projects as a foundation for the country’s rapid and sustainable development in the upcoming period.

The total kilometres of expressways completed in recent years is equal to all those built in the previous 20 years combined. Vietnam is striving to have 3,000 kilometres of expressways by the end of 2025, including completing the eastern North-South Expressway from Cao Bang to Ca Mau; and to have 5,000 kilometres of expressways by 2030 as set out in the 13th Party Congress Resolution. Thus, the 2025 target is extremely challenging and full of obstacles.