Railways must be safe, convenient and punctual to attract passengers.

Identify 3 pillars, sell what the market needs

This afternoon (January 5), Vietnam Railways Corporation held a conference to deploy production and business tasks in 2023.

Speaking at the conference, Deputy Minister of Transport Nguyen Danh Huy emphasized that 2022 marks a milestone in the recovery of the economy, including the railway industry, with increased transport output, reduced deep losses compared to the plan, contributing to the country's economic growth.

Deputy Minister Huy suggested that the railway industry needs to identify three pillars: infrastructure including maintenance, management and exploitation of infrastructure; Transportation; Railway engineering. In which, the final product of the railway is transportation, providing people and businesses with passenger and cargo transportation.

Deputy Minister of Transport Nguyen Danh Huy suggested that Vietnam Railway Corporation identify three pillars of development, focusing on transportation and selling what the market needs.

"The railway must sell what the market needs. To do that, it is necessary to improve service quality. Trains must first be safe, on time, and convenient; only then will they attract passengers," the Deputy Minister pointed out.

Deputy Minister Nguyen Danh Huy emphasized that the Ministry of Transport is very interested in railway development. In addition to the 7,000 billion VND package to upgrade train infrastructure that has been deployed, it will continue to invest in railway infrastructure. Upgrading the main railway is to develop transport. With the obstacles from the mechanism, the Corporation is the subject that is greatly affected, so it needs to proactively coordinate and propose solutions.

“The Ministry of Transport always accompanies businesses to resolve problems in the spirit of respecting the law. Vietnam Railways Corporation needs to set these tasks in 2023 for direction and implementation, and find solutions,” said Deputy Minister Huy.

Regarding the 2023 plan, Mr. Ho Sy Hung, Vice Chairman of the State Capital Management Committee at Enterprises, suggested that the railway should strive to exceed the 2022 train operation plan with a more optimal schedule and ensure safety; improve the financial situation, not only strive to reduce losses but also aim to end losses and make profits.

Regarding restructuring work, it is necessary to identify it as a regular task. However, Mr. Hung emphasized that the Corporation should not be too formalistic, separating and merging into units, but the important thing is effective solutions. The railway industry is limited in terms of capital, technology, and infrastructure, so it is necessary to supplement mechanisms from infrastructure management to operational mechanisms, and coordination with other modes of transport.

Proposing an implementation solution, Mr. Dang Sy Manh, General Director of Vietnam Railways Corporation, said that he will build a train schedule suitable for infrastructure and vehicle capacity; complete plans on service prices; exploit and operate infrastructure and support services; complete the plan for management and maintenance of railway infrastructure in 2023 in accordance with the provisions of the contract and current standards and quality, ensuring disbursement progress...

The railway will focus on developing regional passenger trains (short distance), investing in vehicle quality, improving service, connecting on-train and off-train; offering incentive programs and flexible policies to compete with other means of transport; strengthening links with tourism companies, orienting passenger transport in association with tourism; strengthening container transport, international intermodal transport and actively participating in the logistics chain; researching and developing more specialized train service products, North-South container trains, refrigerated containers...

Set production and business target for 2023 without loss

According to the report of Vietnam Railway Corporation, in 2022, the Corporation's consolidated revenue reached 7,718.2 billion VND, equal to 113.8% over the same period and 115.8% of the yearly plan; reducing losses by about 400 billion VND.

Vice Chairman of the State Capital Management Committee at Enterprises Ho Sy Hung presented the 2022 Emulation Flag of the Committee to Vietnam Railways Corporation.

In addition, the railway focuses highly on peak transport campaigns when the number of passengers increases suddenly; the efficiency of passenger transport increases sharply due to the arrangement of charts, schedules and the selection of reasonable and scientific transport routes suitable to the needs of passengers and service capacity.

Therefore, the growth in production and business results compared to the same period of the freight and passenger transport has recovered after the Covid-19 pandemic and increased, however, output has not yet reached the same level as before the pandemic in 2019.

Setting the target for 2023, the railway determined that transport production and business activities have not yet fully recovered after the Covid-19 pandemic, while still facing many competitive pressures with air and road transport in terms of passenger transport; freight transport will be affected because sea transport, after a period of high fare fluctuations, has decreased back to the old fare level and the supply of sea transport has increased again as before the pandemic.

The railway will implement the restructuring plan of enterprises and affiliated units in accordance with schedule to save production and business costs, but it will inevitably have some impact on the psychology of workers as well as production organization.

On this basis, the railway strives to not incur losses from its main production and business activities, paying VND115 billion to the budget. However, due to having to compensate for expected losses from non-revenue expenses, it will still lose VND55 billion. Strive to ensure that the rate of passenger trains departing on time is 99%, arriving on time is 77% or more.