Airport billboards to be pulled down as dispute reaches climax

Decision No. 1312, dated September 28 and signed by Phan Dang Long, acting director of the Hanoi Information and Culture Department (HICD), stated that 31 billboards from eight advertising firms would have to be removed as they were not installed with proper authorisation from concerned departments.
Of the offenders, 28 billboards belong to seven advertising firms including Viet Anh, Binh Minh and Youth, and three are owned by the Golden Eye Advertising Company Ltd. Long stated in the decision that such illegally erected billboards had “seriously violated current stipulations regarding advertising billboards and affected the safety of flights”.
Under current regulations, an advertising billboard is considered legal only if it has three specific kinds of permits granted by the departments of urban planning, construction and culture and information.
Following Long’s announcement, representatives from advertising firms immediately announced that the decision would not only cause huge financial damages to their businesses, but also adversely affect their reputations among customers, particularly foreign investors.
“At least VND6 billion ($3.8 million) will be lost in materials used in the billboards, in addition to the compensation we will have to pay our customers due to the
collapse of contracts,” said Pham Ba Dung, deputy director of the Viet Anh Advertising Enterprise.
Having erected 12 out of 31 of the total billboards, Viet Anh Advertising owns the largest number of advertisements around the T1 Terminal, which feature well-known foreign brands such as Heineken, Tiger, Carlsberg, San Miguel, INAX, TCL, Brother and Pecasus.
“The biggest loss will be damage to the prestige of the advertising firms and as a consequence, the investment environment may be affected,” Dung said.
Nguyen Dien Quoc Dung, director of Golden Eye Advertising, also envisaged significant damage to his business.
“We have calculated that it will cost nearly VND1 billion ($66,000) to pull down three billboards,” he said.
A proposal on settling the issue of illegal billboards has been submitted by the Vietnam Advertising Association (VAA) to the Hanoi Municipal People’s Committee and HICD.
The VAA proposed that illegal billboards be allowed to stay until mid-2005 when advertising contracts with foreign customers expire.
Dung from Viet Anh Advertising applauded the proposal, and said that if the billboards have to be removed, some advertising firms could be nearly pushed to bankruptcy.
“We have managed to apply for permits from concerned departments but these have yet to be approved as the authorities claim that an outdoor advertising masterplan has not yet been issued,” he said. “We cannot wait for such a masterplan while business opportunities pass by.”
Furthermore, VAA’s general secretary Tran Nguyet Dan said that application procedures for outdoor advertising billboard permits are very complicated and require three different departments to approve the request.
“Another typical thing in outdoor advertising billboards is constant changes in content and pictures within a short time,” Dan explained. “So it is very difficulty for advertising firms to apply for permits correctly.”
Dung from Golden Eye Advertising said that regulations on outdoor advertising billboards should be clear, consistent and have a high level of enforcement so that enterprises cannot be damaged in the same way again.
He said that because his company does not have any permits, it didn’t dare sign contracts with customers and therefore had missed out on several large contracts.