HCM CITY — Nguyễn Thành Phong, chairman of the HCM City People’s Committee, today called on the Ministry of Defence to soon hand over land for construction of the Thủ Thiêm 2 Bridge.

The land on the District 1 side of the proposed bridge over the Sài Gòn River belongs to the Ba Son Corporation and Naval Command Zone 2, and has yet to be handed over though construction kicked off in early 2015 and the bridge had been scheduled to open to traffic last April.

The 1.5km bridge linking the city’s downtown with the Thủ Thiêm New Urban Area is expected to cost VNĐ3.1 trillion (US$135 million).

The city has already handed over 13.6ha of land in the Thủ Thiêm New Urban Area to Đại Quang Minh Company, the builder.

Phong instructed the city Department of Natural Resources and Environment to report on land prices in the area for paying compensation.

He told the Department of Transport to complete the technical design for the bridge, which will be built under the BT (build – transfer) model.

Good performance

The city economy continued to perform well for in July.

Tax revenues increased by 7.17 per cent to VNĐ214.5 trillion ($9.35 billion), services and retail sales grew by 12.5 per cent, and industrial output by 7.33 per cent.

The city’s four key industries -- engineering and automation; electronics; chemicals, rubber, plastics; and food processing -- continued to perform strongly, expanding their markets, investing in technology and improving quality and competitiveness to grow at nearly 8.9 per cent.

Job creation, vocational training and support for people under the poverty line were all carried out efficiently, as figures show.

The number of jobs created rose marginally year-on-year to 201,456, or 67.2 per cent of the full year plan.

FDI doubled to nearly $4.69 billion, an increase of 70.5 per cent.

Exports increased by 7 per cent to $21.4 billion.

Imports rose by 10.3 per cent to $26.79 billion. — VNS