A Vietnam National Shipping Lines (Vinalines) cargo ship. Many SOEs face difficulties and need more time to deal with financial, land and labor problems before equitisation. Photo thuonggiaonline.vn

HÀ NỘI — Only nine state-owned enterprises (SOEs) were given the green light from government for their equitisation plans this year, reported the Ministry of Finance (MoF).

The progress was still “very slow”, said Đặng Quyết Tiến, director of Corporate Finance Department, MoF at the ministry’s press conference on the local financial and production situation and the restructuring and equitisation of SOEs yesterday in Hà Nội.

Tiến said though equitisation and divestment had a positive impact on the development of the stock market, improving the performance of firms, the slow progress was “concerning”.

Among nine SOEs reported, three were on the list of 128 SOEs required to be equitised by the Prime Minister Nguyễn Xuân Phúc in the period from 2016 to 2020.

He said since 2016, Việt Nam had 168 SOEs approved for equitisation, of which 36 were in the PM’s list.

According to the PM's plan, only 28 per cent was met. By the end of 2020, 92 other SOEs should be equitised.

At the press conference, the MoF’s report showed the divestment in SOEs since 2016 was also slow. Up to now, state divestment only reached VNĐ8.9 trillion or 7.8 per cent of the plan.

Tiến told Vietnam News Agency: “Some ministries, localities, and SOEs do not seriously implement the equitisation, divestment and restructuring plans.

“Many SOEs faced difficulties and need longer period dealing with financial, land and labour problems for their equitisation.”

MoF also reported that there were 855 firms with State capital including 505 wholly State owned firms and 350 State-invested firms with the total state capital of VNĐ1,533 trillion.

The total assets of these SOEs in the fiscal year of 2018 reached VNĐ3,715 trillion, an increase of 2 per cent compared to 2017. Among them, 110 firms or 13 per cent reported losses.

Tiến said the ministry will ask the PM to allow it to directly review and clarify responsibilities of SOEs that failed to equitise in time. Also, to help overcome difficulties for the local equitisation process, MoF was amending some articles in Decree No. 126/2017 / NĐ-CP and Decree No. 32/2018 / NĐ-CP.— VNS