The Southeast region has a natural advantage, especially with a port system passing through many localities connecting to the world in water transport for many ships with large tonnage in and out.

The cost is too great

Such a great advantage, but not able to bring into full play its effects and potentials. Causes of poor transport infrastructure connection, lack of synchronization among regional link localities leading to road overload, increased logictis costs, disadvantages in attracting import and export, and transport competition with other water in the region.

It is easy to see that goods are still concentrated in river and sea ports in Ho Chi Minh City. Typically Cat Lai port is increasingly overloaded, causing serious congestion and traffic unsafety on the highways of Hanoi, Dong Van Cong, Nguyen Thi Dinh, An Phu intersection, My Thuy ...

While the Cai Mep - Thi Vai port cluster was invested and built at a cost of $ 2 billion, it is the only deep-water international port cluster in Vietnam that can accommodate ships of over 100,000 tons and becomes one of the 19 above ports. the world can receive super ships.

This port group officially came into operation in 2009, more than 10 years of operation, but the volume of ships entering and leaving as well as cargo through capacity reached less than 20%.

Goods after the ship docked or transported to the port, road traffic  encountered many obstacles. Because of traffic jams, many localities in the area are prohibited from trucks and container trucks running during the day. As a result, these vehicles only operate at night, causing overload from 21 pm to 5 am, slow traffic, most of the volume of goods is not in time to be transported, so they have to be deposited at the warehouse. transfer costs extra.

During a transport seminar for the Southeast region, analyzing the cause of the "sluggish" situation at Cai Mep - Thi Vai port, a representative of a transport association said the time for completing cargo procedures at This is still very long, specifically from 10 to 15 days.

The cost of transporting goods is too high, businesses hesitate to bring goods to Thi Vai - Cai Mep port. As with the road from Nhon Trach to Cai Mep only 40km long but the cost of transporting a container is up to 4.3 million VND, while the road from Nhon Trach to Cat Lai is 80km long, but the transportation cost is only about 3.3 million VND / container.

Lack of road connection, freight cost is difficult to compete with other countries in the region. As from Ho Chi Minh City to Vung Tau, the distance is less than 150km, but it is more expensive than going to Singapore.

That is the opinion of the director of a manufacturing enterprise who has stated in the seminar on solutions to reduce unofficial costs in logistics that I attended but did not see the answer, of course there was no person responsible.

It is necessary to soon close the ring 3-4 routes

I am glad that a number of regional connection projects have been paid attention and implemented. The project to build Phuoc An bridge has just been approved by the government of Ba Ria - Vung Tau province to invest, implemented in the period of 2021-2025.

The 57.8km Ben Luc - Long Thanh Expressway was started from July 2014, with a total investment of 31,320 billion ($ 1.6 billion), connecting Ben Luc district, Long An province with Long Thanh district, Dong Nai province. , go through Ho Chi Minh City.

However, if these two projects are completed and put into use, it will be difficult to bring into full play the efficiency and clear the goods transportation for the Southeast because there is still a lack of synchronous traffic connection between localities. , ports, transport routes.

Ring Road 3 project is nearly 90km long, including 4 sections with a total capital of about 55,805 billion VND. In which, ground clearance money is more than 5,630 billion in 4 localities.

The first point connecting with the Ben Luc - Long Thanh expressway is under construction, then passing through 4 provinces / cities: Dong Nai, Ho Chi Minh City, Binh Duong, Long An. The end point intersects with HCMC - Trung Luong expressway and Ben Luc - Long Thanh expressway.

Unfortunately, after decades of approval, the project has been implemented so far, there is a section of Tan Van - Binh Chuan (Binh Duong), 16km long, to be built. The rest are not done.

Ring Road 4 is nearly 200km long passing through Ba Ria - Vung Tau, Binh Duong, Dong Nai, Ho Chi Minh City with a total preliminary investment of about 99,000 billion VND. In which, the sections of Phu My - Trang Bom (45.5km), Trang Bom - Highway 13 (nearly 52km); Highway 13 - National Highway 22 (nearly 23km), Highway 22 - Ben Luc (41.6km long), Ben Luc - Hiep Phuoc (nearly 36km), Only the Ben Luc - Hiep Phuoc section (nearly 36km long) passes through HCMC and Long An) are studied for investment proposals, the rest has not been studied.

Need to close ring road 3 soon, deploy belt 4. These two routes will basically link the region, contributing to convenient connection of traffic with major roads in the region, effectively promoting their strengths and potential waterway transport capacity, including the ports of Cai Mep - Thi Vai, Binh Thuan - Hiep Phuoc ports ...

Moreover, it plays a role in promoting socio-economic development for both the Southern key economic region and the Mekong River Delta, competing with other countries in the region. Sharing overload for highways Hanoi, Dong Van Cong, Highway 51, Ho Chi Minh City - Long Thanh - Dau Giay Expressway, Ho Chi Minh City - Trung Luong ...

To bring into full play the highway Buc Luc - Long Thanh, Phuoc An bridge after being completed and put into use. In addition, it helps to shorten travel time between localities, limit accidents and traffic jams, and reduce traffic pressure for Ho Chi Minh City.

Ring Road 3, belt 4 deployment plays a very important role, do everything before or after, but do it as soon as possible. With too large investment capital, more than 150,000 billion.

Should it be that, besides calling for investment in socialization, in the immediate future, using the budget to immediately implement the compensation and clearance work, it is easier to attract investors and limit the capital team that incurs costs.

The segments that do not have or are difficult to attract investors will be implemented in the form of public investment to actively implement according to the plan, then sell to the operator and recover costs to the budget. Once completed, road traffic will generate capital from the collection of fees for seaport infrastructure, navigation, and associated services.