Reporter Trong Hung from the Da Nang Newspaper recently interviewed a representative from the city authorities, some economic experts and some business owners to gather their opinions about the implementation of the city’s “Year for Businesses 2014” programme.

The Vice-chairman of the municipal People’s Committee and Head of the city’s Steering Board for the programme, Mr Vo Duy Khuong, remarked that the municipal Department of Planning and Investment had shortened the time for business registration procedures to 7 days from the 8 days in 2013.  In addition, the Department had handled online business registration services within only 2 days.

Workers at a local enterprise

Last year, local relevant agencies also promptly re-checked business land-use outside local IPs, and took back any under-used or unused land in order to re-lease it to businesses in need of land for production activities.

Under the programme, the city authorities increased the local Development and Investment Fund to 120 billion VND to offer loans to local businesses for developing their production and export activities.  Meanwhile, 50 billion VND from the city’s budget was spent on establishing the Credit Guarantee Fund (CGF) for local small and medium-sized enterprises last year.  The city authorities are now appealing for more donations from credit organisations and business associations to raise the CGF to 100 billion VND by the end of this year.

The Director of the city’s branch of the State Bank of Viet Nam (SBV), Mr Vo Minh, said that last year saw numerous effective dialogues between representatives from local banks and local businesses in order to help them overcome their difficulties.  In addition, the city’s branch of SBV directed local commercial banks to offer credit preferential packages and loans at low interest rates to local businesses.  This aimed to help them develop their production activities, reduce their output prices, and enhance their competitiveness. 

The Vice-chairman cum General Secretary of the city’s Association of Small and Medium-sized Enterprises, Mr Nguyen Van Ly, remarked that last year’s programme upheld the important role of local businesses and created a new momentum for fostering the city’s economic growth.   He added that the positive results of the programme were mainly attributed to the joint efforts of the city authorities, relevant agencies, and political organisations in helping local businesses overcome their difficulties within the context of the global economic slowdown.

The Director of the BQ Shoe Company, Mr Phan Hai, said that the “Supply-demand Links amongst Businesses” campaign was successful in the city last year.  This had made significant contributions to promoting cooperation between local businesses for mutual development.

According to the Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Phu Hoang Transport Services Company, Mr Le Vinh Quang, the authorities at all levels, local relevant agencies and departments had made every effort to create even more favourable conditions for local businesses to operate well.  Thanks to this, the city saw positive changes in local production and business activities, and the municipal authorities won the trust of the local business community.