IZ investors set to get twinkle in their eyes

City-based relevant state agencies were recently urged by local authorities to accelerate industrial zone (IZ) construction in the area and they must review IZ infrastructure investor capacity and take action towards delayed project investors.

“Delayed projects shall have their investment licences taken back to replace with other more viable ones, if important,” said Can Tho City People’s Committee deputy chairman Vo Thanh Thong.

“The project’s slow progress was largely attributed to still high land rent and constant [compensation and resettlement] policy changes,” said Nguyen Tien Dung, director of Building Materials, Construction and Trading Company’s Can Tho city branch and developer of Hung Phu 2A IZ in the city.

Dung said the company had pumped VND170 billion ($8.1 million) into the IZ, but just had 30ha in cleared land and charmed four investment projects.

Cai Rang District People’s Committee deputy chairman Tran Thanh Can said the district paid special attention to IZ investors. “However, not land was cleared in the district in 2012 as investors were bogged down in hardships,” said Can.

To facilitate IZ infrastructure development, Can Tho City Export Processing and Industrial Zones Authority asked the city’s management to map out a specific incentive regime in the spirit of Resolution 45-NQ/TW of the Politburo covering ‘building and developing Can Tho city during the course of national industrialisation and modernisation,’ according to authority head Vo Thanh Hung.

Proposed incentives include tax reduction/exemption and preferential lending to IZ infrastructure investors, a shift from IZ land leases to land allocation while collecting land rent, a change to the  Hung Phu 2B IZ model into a hi-tech park and land rental downward revisions in some IZ areas.

“These proposals were basically accepted, except the shift of land leases into land allocation which is a big policy still without precedent, so we need comments from central management bodies,” said Thong.

Can Tho city is home to five operating IZs (Tra Noc I, Tra Noc II, Hung Phu I, Hung Phu 2A and Thot Not) attracting 206 projects leasing around 565ha of industrial land worth $1.8 billion in total committed capital, including 22 foreign direct investment projects worth $181 million.

Of the remaining IZs, the 67ha Hung Phu 2B is in the compensation stage while Thot Not IZ’s second phase (400ha), O Mon (600ha) and Bac O Mon (400ha) are in the planning stage with construction slated from 2015.