Amended land law can remove current limitations

Land price is one of the most important contents in the draft Law on Land (amended) which has a great impact on socioeconomic development, state budget, business environment, and receives much attention from society.

Dao Trung Chinh - Director, Land Resources Planning and Development, Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment

In recent years, the policy on land prices has been gradually improved, contributing to increasing revenue for the state budget, strengthening state management of land, encouraging organisations and individuals to use the land effectively, and creating an increasingly stable source of revenue for the state budget year by year.

However, the current situation shows that some provisions of the law on land prices are no longer effective and reveal limitations.

During the process of collecting public opinions on the draft law, the content related to land price has received more than one million comments. After collecting and considering, the drafting agency is expected to specify three land valuation methods in the amended law: direct comparison, based on income, and land price adjustment coefficient.

The draft amended law legalises specific regulations on the method, content, and process of land valuation for the three proposed methods and conditions applied to each specific case. This is to ensure transparency, accuracy, and consistency in determining land prices, shorten the time to determine specific land prices in the locality, ensure the progress of the valuation, reduce the waiting time of investors, and simplify procedures.

The draft law also specifies in detail the principles of land pricing that follow the land valuation method in the market, strictly comply with the method, process, and procedures for land valuation. This is to ensure honesty, objectivity, publicity and transparency and independence between the consulting organisation, the Land Price List Appraisal Council, the Specific Land Price Appraisal Council, and all related agencies and individuals.

Information to determine the land price by the aforementioned methods must ensure: the land price stated in the transferring contract was notarised by competent bodies, land price was fixed at an auction of land use rights without being affected by any factors which can cause a sudden increase or decrease in price, family relative transactions, or other incentives recorded in the national database on land use rights.

For cases where land price information is not available in the land database, land price information shall be collected through surveys on revenue, expenses, and income from land use in the real market.

The government recently abolished the land price framework and replaced with a land price list which will be first published and implemented from 2026, which will be adjusted and amended regularly and annually. In parallel, the current land price framework will continue to be used until the end of 2025 so that localities have enough time to develop and issue a new land price list in accordance with the new provisions of the Law on Land.

The time to determine the land price for each case of land allocation, land lease, permission to change land use purpose, land use extension, changing the land use form and adjustment of land allocation and land lease decisions will also be specified in detail.

It is clearly stated that the competent People’s Committee must approve a decision on specific land prices within 180 days from the date that decision on land allocation, land lease, or permission to change the use purpose, land use extension, changing land use form, adjustment of land allocation and land lease decisions, adjustment of detailed planning are issued.

It also supplements the process of building land price list, the responsibilities of the local People’s Council and People’s Committee in formulating the land price list, the construction of land price lists according to value zones, standard land parcels for areas with digital maps and land price databases.

Innovations in land price regulations will be the foundation for effectively exploiting land resources, supporting the socioeconomic development process, and creating a driving force for Vietnam to become a high-income developed country oriented by the Party and state.

Experts consider major changes to land valuation Drafts to amend and supplement Decree No.44/2014/ND-CP on land prices and Circular No.36/2014/TT- BTNMT on land valuation were discussed at a VIR seminar on the issue on July 27.

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