With a length of only about 57km, the Ben Luc - Long Thanh expressway cost more than 31,000 billion VND to build. That's just phase 1, which means it will be much more expensive.
Ben Luc - Long Thanh Expressway is longer than 57.1 km passing through Long An (2.7 km), Ho Chi Minh City (26.4 km) and Dong Nai (28 km) by the Highway Development Investment Corporation Vietnam Express (VEC) is the investor.
Total initial investment capital is 31,320 billion VND (phase 1) - equivalent to more than 1.6 billion USD. This is a national key project on the North - South expressway axis, designed according to type A highway standards with 4 traffic lanes and 2 emergency stop lanes, design speed of 100 km/h.
Unusually high costs
Many people were startled when looking at the investment cost of building 1 km of highway of this project because it costs 25.8 million USD (about 554 billion VND), the highest compared to other highway projects that have ever been built. built in the southern region.
In this project, the investment rate also has a big difference when nearly 11 km of the total length has an investment rate of 60.7 million USD/km, the remaining 46.9 km is 17.84 million USD/km. kilometer.
According to VEC leaders, the investment rate is about 60.7 million USD/km because it is all bridges and viaducts, including 2 cable-stayed bridges with 2 large aperture cable planes (Binh Khanh bridge and Phuoc Khanh bridge), static 55 m high with steel sheet pile foundation structure, using more than 30% of materials originating from Japan (according to loan conditions). The route passing through Ho Chi Minh City and Dong Nai has high site clearance costs, which also contributes to the higher investment rate of this section...
Direction of Ben Luc - Long Thanh expressway.
This is not the first time the cost of highway construction is at an expensive level and most of the country's highway projects are too high. Dr. Pham Xuan Mai (Ho Chi Minh City University of Technology) said that the investor explains the high investment rate of 1 km of expressway partly because of the high site clearance costs when passing through Ho Chi Minh City and Dong Nai.
But where does the project actually go? “The areas the project goes through are all located on the outskirts of Ho Chi Minh City and Dong Nai, through fields..., how can it cost so much to clear the land? In other countries, highways are built across seas, passes, and tunnels through mountains, but the cost is not as high as in Vietnam, only from 5-15 million USD/km.
Is the cost of building highways in Vietnam expensive because we have not closely monitored the design and construction stages? Isn't that what the investor said? That's what the investor said! - Dr. Mai analyzed.
Increasing
Another unusual thing about some highways in Vietnam is that under the same natural conditions, the cost for 1 km of highway is different. For example, the cost for 1 km of the Ho Chi Minh City - Long Thanh - Dau Giay expressway is double that of the Ho Chi Minh City - Trung Luong expressway. And now, the cost for 1 km of Ben Luc - Long Thanh expressway is 3 times higher than the Ho Chi Minh City - Trung Luong route.
Traffic expert - Dr. Pham Sanh cited: The first expressway in the South, Ho Chi Minh City - Trung Luong, had an initial investment of 4,900 billion VND, but when finalized, this number increased to 9,800 billion VND. At that time, many experts responded that investment costs were too high, the Ministry of Transport responded that due to weak soil, many areas had to build viaducts and there was not much highway technology... so the investment rate was pushed up. investment is high.
Perspective of Phuoc Khanh cable bridge project on Ben Luc - Long Thanh highway.
“For the first time, we still blamed objectivity, until the Ho Chi Minh City - Long Thanh - Dau Giay expressway was also about 50 km long but the investment cost jumped to about 20,000 billion VND. When the National Assembly responded, the ministry cited figures about highway investment rates in Vietnam being cheaper than Japan, Korea and approximately the same as China.
The Ministry of Transport loves to compare Vietnamese highway standards with foreign ones without knowing that foreign highways only go about 10 km to have a stop and a place to handle accidents; And I don't have a place to go to the bathroom! Now, the Ben Luc - Long Thanh expressway is only about 57 km long, but the investor "squeezed" an investment capital figure of more than 31,000 billion VND. And this is only phase 1, meaning this route will be much more expensive" - Mr. Sanh stated.
Why high? Who bears the burden?
Economic expert - Dr. Le Dang Doanh said that high highway construction costs will lead to very high traffic fees and transportation costs of Vietnamese goods will increase greatly compared to other countries in the region. Vietnamese goods will have higher prices and reduced competitiveness. At the end of this year, the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) opens, goods from other countries flood in and are cheaper than Vietnamese goods, the risk of us losing right at home is very close.
“Some contractors told me that there must be a “lubrication” fee, pushing up road construction costs. If they cannot pay this fee, they will find ways to cut corners on the project, as evidenced by the fact that highways in Vietnam are always in a state of "high prices, poor quality", and as soon as they are built, they are damaged. There are even sinkholes..." - Mr. Doanh said.
Recently, the Ministry of Transport announced that the Hanoi - Hai Phong Expressway only invested about 20,000 billion VND but sold 40,000 billion VND with a big profit, proving that the cost of building highways in our country is still low. Dr. Pham Sanh argued: This is a very lame comparison, because no matter how much you sell, I will buy, the important thing is how much profit will I take and how many years will I collect the fee? Investors don't care how much it costs to build, they only care how many years they will collect fees to make a profit...
According to Nld.com.vn