Hạ Long City in Quảng Ninh province. Photo VNA/VNS

QUẢNG NINH Quảng Ninh will become a centrally-managed city by 2030 with seven subordinate cities, making it a large metropolitan city with regional and international significance.

The Quảng Ninh Province’s People’s Committee has approved the Urban Development Programme of Quảng Ninh Province to 2023. The province will develop seven cities within the centrally-run city, districts will not be formed in the city.

This model is unique as there is currently nothing similar explicitly defined in existing legal documents.

Those cities will be linked together by advanced technical infrastructure systems such as urban public transport systems or information and communication technology infrastructure.

The seven subordinate cities include Hạ Long, Quảng Yên, Uông Bí, Đông Triều, Cẩm Phả, Vân Đồn and Móng Cái cities.

Those cities are invested in building socio-economic and technical infrastructure following the criteria of Grade 1 cities by 2030. There are 152 commune-level administrative units, of which there are 77 wards.

The urban population is up to 850,000 people, accounting for 86.7 per cent of the province’s population.

Five other urban areas in the districts are Tiên Yên, Đầm Hà, Bình Liêu, Ba Chẽ and Cô Tô.

According to the programme, Quảng Ninh Province will qualify to be a centrally-run city by 2023 and will strive to achieve structure and socio-economic development criteria. The other cities also will attempt to meet the criteria of a Grade 1 city.

Currently, Quảng Ninh has 13 urban areas of which one city is a Grade 1 provincial-run city.

Along with that, Quảng Ninh also has two coastal economic zones and three border gate economic zones. The province's urbanisation rate reaches 67.5 per cent.

By 2030, the province will strive to have 12 administrative units with 12 urban areas, of which, four are Grade 1 cities including Hạ Long, Móng Cái, Uông Bí and Cẩm Phả.

Tiên Yên will be a Grade 3 city, Đầm Hà, Bình Liêu-Hoành Mô-Đồng Văn and Cô Tô will be Grade 4 cities and one city of Grade 5 is Ba Chẽ Town.

The urbanisation rate will be over 75 per cent. — VNS