Dien Ban strives to increase budget revenue

The decline in revenue from land exploitation has affected the total budget revenue of Dien Ban. Photo: VL

Improving budget revenue is considered an urgent requirement to ensure local socio -economic development targets. However, in the current context of slow recovery of some economic sectors; many state policies and mechanisms are still stuck and have not been resolved; businesses continue to face difficulties and operate at a standstill... it seems that the budget revenue target of Dien Ban town is still quite difficult.

Surrounded by difficulties

According to the People's Committee of Dien Ban town, in the first quarter of 2024, the socio-economic situation in the town had many positive changes, industrial production continued to recover, the value of industrial production reached 5,536 billion VND, up 4.42% over the same period; agricultural, forestry and fishery production was stable...

However, the local budget revenue in the first quarter of 2024 was quite low. As of March 20, the total budget revenue in the town was only over 388 billion VND (out of the total 2,700 billion VND of assigned domestic revenue), reaching 11.28% of the estimate and equal to 62.05% compared to the same period in 2023.

Some revenues are very low, such as land use fees reaching more than 10/1,466 billion VND (0.73% of the estimate), special consumption tax reaching nearly 20/569 billion VND (3.45% of the estimate).

These are two revenue items that account for the main proportion of regular and investment expenditures in the town, thereby continuing to prolong the disadvantages that Dien Ban has been facing when budget revenue is not achieved (in 2023, revenue shortfall is 256 billion VND).

Mr. Tran Uc - Chairman of Dien Ban Town People's Committee analyzed that one of the first reasons why the revenue in the area is not achieved is that many businesses are having difficulties in operating, especially construction investment businesses.

For example, the special consumption tax on beer factories has decreased for the past two consecutive years (Dien Ban enjoys 43%), greatly affecting the budget management and direction activities. Another backlog is the issue of land clearance, resettlement... when many mechanisms, policies, and guiding documents of the state are still entangled but slow to change, becoming a barrier in the urban development process of Dien Ban.

“The town has set up many committees and teams to go to each village and block to fix and resolve problems, but there are still obstacles, causing many key projects to be delayed. In addition, the continuous inspection and examination (some of which the Government Inspectorate has not yet concluded) has created great pressure in the implementation process,” said Mr. Uc.

In fact, since the beginning of the year, although Dien Ban's industrial production has recovered, it has not reached the level before the COVID-19 pandemic. Attracting businesses to invest in industrial clusters is limited because the technical infrastructure of some industrial clusters has not been fully invested, businesses have to wait for land to build. The disbursement of public investment capital has not met the planned progress. Over the first 3 months of the year, the disbursement rate was only about 3% of the capital allocated according to the plan.

Although agricultural production has grown, it still cannot make up for Dien Ban's revenue shortfall. Photo: VL

Need support from the province

As a dynamic economic zone and the northern growth pole of the province, Dien Ban economic development is considered to play an important role in the overall development of Quang Nam.

In previous years, Dien Ban was known as one of the localities with a vibrant real estate market, many projects were deployed, invested and exploited, bringing large budget sources to the town.

However, since the COVID-19 pandemic, along with the general slowdown of the whole country, the real estate market is still quite gloomy. According to the forecast of DKRA Real Estate Services Group, the real estate market in Dien Ban in the second quarter of 2024 cannot improve, especially the land segment.

Given the impacts and difficulties of the economy, it is forecasted that the possibility of budget deficit of Dien Ban in 2024 will be very high if there is no timely solution.

According to Mr. Tran Uc, in order to promote local socio-economic development in the remaining months of 2024, the town will strive to focus on managing production organization; well implementing compensation and site clearance for key projects; speeding up the disbursement of public investment capital; closely managing budget revenue and expenditure, and implementing focused investments...

Besides, support from the province and departments and branches is needed, especially to solve problems related to real estate projects, helping to remove difficulties for businesses.

Specifically, the Department of Planning and Investment needs to advise the Provincial People's Committee to extend the implementation of projects in the town (due to delays due to inspections and the impact of the COVID-19 epidemic).

This will help businesses have a legal basis and favorable conditions to borrow capital to continue investing, because for Dien Ban, revenue from land use fees and special consumption tax is extremely important. Therefore, resolving legal issues for real estate projects will help businesses recover and contribute to the budget revenue.

“In the current context, it is very difficult to complete the budget collection target because everything depends on the province, Dien Ban itself can hardly do anything, especially real estate projects. Therefore, the Department of Finance and the Department of Planning and Investment need to calculate, research and advise the province to make adjustments, otherwise Dien Ban will have difficulty achieving the assigned plan,” Mr. Uc shared.

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