HÀ NỘI — Hà Nội plans to attract 15-20 new projects with expected total investment of US$250-300 million in industrial zones and clusters in the capital city this year.

Sectors to be prioritised include part supplies, electronics and mechanics industries.

The Management Board of Industrial and Processing Zones said the focus would be on speeding up land clearance and improving infrastructure to make Hà Nội an attractive destination for large investors.

One of the difficulties was the limited available land in the capital city, according to the management board. There were 13ha of vacant land in Quang Minh Industrial Zone, 25ha in Phú Nghĩa Industrial Zone and 36ha in Nam Hà Nội available for investment this year.

Lê Hồng Thăng, director of the municipal Department of Industry and Trade, said attracting investment in the capital city’s industrial clusters continued to be a struggle due to high investment costs, even as investors in clusters were mainly of a smaller scale.

According to Phạm Khắc Tuấn, head of the management board, municipal authorities had pledged to hasten administrative reform and improve investment climate to attract capital for industrial zones and clusters.

In addition, the capital city would also focus on developing the labour force in localities around and near the industrial zones and clusters as well as creating favourable conditions to boost the part supplies industry through business-to-bank and business-to-business connecting programmes.

The city would give priority to high-tech, environmentally-friendly investment and products of high added value and those that could compete with others in the market.

According to the Department of Industry and Trade, the city has developed or is in the process of developing 19 industrial zones with total area of nearly 525ha, together with 110 industrial clusters, totaling 3,000ha.

The department proposed another nine industrial clusters be developed by 2020 and 18 more by 2030, noting that completing the infrastructure system was of great importance.

In addition, the department proposed to exempt land use fees in the first stage for investors as well as provide support to investors in treating waste at industrial zones and clusters.

In the first five months of this year, industrial zones and clusters in the capital city attracted seven new projects, worth more than US$44 million in registered capital, and expanded six existing projects, worth $18.5 million.

To date, Hà Nội has attracted 629 projects in industrial zones and clusters with total registered capital of $5.9 billion. More than half of the projects were foreign-invested, worth $5.34 billion. — VNS