Danang seeks investors for infrastructure, tourism projects

HCMC – Danang City’s government organized two conferences to lure investors for the central coast city’s infrastructure and tourism projects under the framework of the Invest Danang 2017 Forum taking place on October 14-15.

In the infrastructure sector, local authorities continued attracting investment, especially from the private sector, into key projects in the coming time.

According to city vice chairman Nguyen Ngoc Tuan, the conference aimed to introduce important projects to international and domestic investors, donors and overseas organizations. The city wished to draw attention, feedback and suggestions from potential investors to complete the projects.

Specifically, the city is seeking investors for huge projects such as Lien Chieu Port which is able to handle 100,000 DWT ships and container vessels from 6,000 to 8,000 TEUs, and Danang railway station relocation.

To secure connectivity with neighboring localities, authorities of Danang and Quang Nam Province approved in principle to develop a tramway project linking Danang with Hoi An City.

In addition, local government is preparing a solid waste treatment complex and a water environment improvement project. The two projects are expected to deal with urban and beach pollution in the central city.

Given the importance of information technology application, Danang is calling for private investors to take part in its smart traffic management project and media and information technology development project.

The conference is a forum to exchange experiences in official development assistance project implementation and public-private partnership, helping partners and investors learn about key infrastructure projects in Danang. Many international financial organizations committed to give capital support for the city’s projects.

At the tourism conference, enterprises said the city has large potential for tourism development. However, slow-moving port and yacht wharf projects have dampened waterway tourism growth.

Besides, the city is short of incentives for investors of entertainment services, especially night entertainment spots, shopping and cuisine centers, large-scale art performance programs and distinctive tourism products.

In the coming time, Danang will launch programs and plans to assist investors, speed up promotion activities, develop tourism products and call on investment for the manpower and technology sectors.

According to the tourism department, the city will concentrate on three main groups of products including sea tourism and high-class leisure, shopping and meeting-incentive-conference-exhibition (MICE) tourism, and cultural, historical and ecological tourism. There will be auxiliary products such as spiritual, culture-culinary, healthcare and sports tourism.

The city will also focus on manpower training for the tourism sector and strengthen regional connection to promote advantages of coastal central localities.

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The Benefits of Mediation Services in Vietnam

The process of integrating with market economy is developing strongly, which creates many opportunities for businesses to extend their operation and cooperate with international companies. As a result, dispute arising is inevitable. To coincide with benefits, especially information confidentiality under parties’ agreement, commercial mediation is one of the commercial alternative dispute resolution which is more and more popular.

Commercial mediation is a dispute resolution negotiated by parties and the mediator is the third party as an intermediary to support parties to resolve dispute under the regulations of Decree 22/2017/ND-CP on February 24th, 2017. Following the regulations, commercial mediation can be negotiated by parties before, after or at any time of dispute resolution process. By Decree 22, commercial mediation is applied in cases of a dispute between parties with at least one party practicing commercial activities or another dispute under the laws can be resolved by the commercial mediation. Moreover, participating in commercial mediation is voluntary and all the information of mediation shall be kept secret under parties’ agreement, provided that agreement’s content is legal.

Commercial mediation is becoming a popular dispute resolution because of its simple and flexible procedure, economical cost for parties. Parties have chance to choose a suitable procedure and avoid complicated legal procedure. Under the law on parties’ self-determination to choose any mediator and a place to proceed procedures, which helps parties select a mediator with professional skills on dispute resolution. Furthermore, parties could reach an agreement with good will and cooperating spirit. Both still continue to develop and protect business relationship because of parties’ benefits. Under the Decree, all the information involving dispute must be kept secret, unless parties have written agreement or current law has other regulations.

Under the law, parties are entitled to choose a mediator to resolve dispute. According to Decree 22/2017/ND-CP, commercial mediators include commercial case mediators and mediators from commercial mediation institutions selected by the parties or appointed by a commercial mediation institution at the request of disputing parties to support them to resolve dispute pursuant to regulations of this Decree. A person who wants to become a mediator must qualify conditions of Article 7 of Decree 22. Apart from general moral standards following Law on Civil, mediators must have a university or higher qualification and at least two years of working experience in their educated discipline, also mediation skills as well as legal understanding, knowledge of business and commercial practice. Instead of bringing the case to court, which parties cannot predict the result, even inextricable, choosing a mediator who is knowledgeable and experienced could help parties resolve dispute smoothly.

Pursuant to Civil Procedure Code 2015, time for resolving commercial disputes belonging to the jurisdiction of the Court could take years. Meanwhile, choosing mediation, parties take less time to resolve dispute. Moreover, dispute is absolutely resolved by parties’ agreement because in the mediating procedure, with mediator’s support, parties can show their decision on dispute resolution. Then, they can save significant cost.

Another benefit of dispute resolution is that parties decide themselves how to resolve dispute and can know the result. This is a prominent advantage of dispute resolution compared with other resolutions, which have unpredictable result. Importantly, mediation is a private procedure so that parties’ name is not revealed publicly during mediating procedure, decrease hazards to parties’ business reputation.

According to Investment Climate Advisory Services of the World Bank Group, Alternative Dispute Resolution Center Manual: A Guide for Practitioners on Establishing and Managing ADR Centers, mediating resolution has brought many benefits. For individual benefits, mediation reduces the need for enforcement proceedings to ensure one party complies with an agreement, since the parties enter into their settlement agreements consensually. For private sector benefits, mediation enhances private sector development by creating a better environment for business. It lowers the direct and indirect costs that businesses incur in enforcing contracts and resolving disputes.

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HCMC calls for investment in infrastructure

The government of HCMC has rolled out hundreds of projects, including six in Thu Thiem New Urban Area, which will need local and foreign investors to get involved in.

City vice chairman Tran Vinh Tuyen told an investment promotion conference on October 11 that the city would develop a comprehensive traffic system to fuel socio-economic development and ease the pressure of high population growth on infrastructure.

The conference was attended by 500 investors, and representatives of municipal agencies and departments.

There are 64 traffic infrastructure development projects, five urban rehabilitation projects and seven flood control projects requiring private sector capital. Eleven national-level projects will be implemented in the city, including nine for traffic improvement.

The city looks to become one of the biggest economic, financial, commercial and science-technology centers in Southeast Asia. Therefore, in its development plan by 2020 with a vision towards 2025, the city will need private investment in services including finance, banking-insurance, tourism, transport-warehousing, post-telecom, information technology, real estate, consulting, science and technology, healthcare, and education.

The four priority groups of industries are mechanical engineering, electronics-information technology, chemical-rubber-plastic and food-foodstuff processing, and urban infrastructure, environment, healthcare and manpower.

Tuyen said the city would promote domestic and international investments in these sectors so that it can become a modern, friendly and livable place.

According to a construction plan until 2020 and after 2025, the city will be expanded towards four directions – east, south, northwest and southwest, said a representative of the Department of Zoning and Architecture.

The city is working on eight metro lines, three tram lines and a monorail line with a combined length of 220 kilometers. The Saigon Hi-Tech Park in District 9, and new urban areas like Thu Thiem, Saigon South, Thanh Da South, Tay Bac and Hiep Phuoc are underway, offering lots of opportunities for investors.

Vo Van Hoan, office manager of  the HCMC People’s Committee, said the city would need a staggering US$40 billion to fund projects in seven breakthrough programs until 2020. But the city alone cannot afford to raise such a huge amount, so capital from domestic private and foreign firms would have to be sought, he said.

The city also said huge private capital would be needed for upgrading 500 old and deteriorating apartment buildings, and developing new housing blocks.

Source: The Saigon Times

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Employee Subject to Unilateral Termination of the Labor Contract Could Claim Unemployment Insurance

Unemployment insurance is a measure to assist workers in a market economy. In addition to providing financial support to stabilize the lives of employees during the period of unemployment, the main purpose of unemployment insurance is to help the unemployed to find a suitable and stable job, through vocational training, counseling and job referral.

When the labor contract is unilaterally terminated by the employee, the employee does not need to have a certificate from the employer that the legal termination is legal, to be eligible for Unemployment Insurance (UI).

Within 03 months since the date of termination of the labor contract, the employee who doesn’t obtain a new job and wish to receive UI only need to submit an application for unemployment insurance and one of the document following documents:

i) The labor contract or contract has expired or has been completed under a labor contract;

ii) Resignation decision;

iii) Decisive dismissal;

iv) Disciplinary decision on dismissal;

v) Notice or agreement to terminate the labor contract or contract of employment.

The unemployed shall receive a Decision on unemployment insurances within 15 working days from the filing date. From the 16th day, the unemployed shall be entitled to unemployment insurance as requested.

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