Experts call for Gov't review of local oil refinery development

Under the initial plan, the Nhon Hoi oil refinery plant in Binh Dinh Province with a total investment of US$22 billion from the PTT, a Thai oil and gas group, was scheduled to be granted an investment licence in June but till now, the project has not received one, Hai quan (Customs) newspaper reported.

The Southern Petrochemical Refinery Complex project invested by the Long Son Chemical and Oil Ltd Company also faced hurdles in implementing the project.

The Nghi Son Petrochemical Refinery Complex in Nghi Son, Thanh Hoa Province with an investment of $9.9 billion from a Japanese investor faced a similar situation. By August, implementation of the project's engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contract has reached 63.9 per cent, 6.24 per cent lower than its plan.

The project is under development, but the Viet Nam National Oil and Gas Group (PetroVietnam), the company that procures products of the Nghi Son project, expected the plant to begin commercial operations in 2017 and will reach its designed capacity by 2018.

The PetroVietnam has said it will be difficult to procure products of the Nghi Son oil refinery plant, so the group has proposed to the ministries of Finance and of Industry and Trade to provide import quotas of oil after restoring the balance between demand and supply.

That action will create opportunities for the local refinery plants such as Nghi Son and Dung Quat to sell their products and ensure efficiency in investment of the projects and the national energy security, PetroVietnam has said.

In addition, the PetroVietnam has also suggested to the Government that they reduce import tariffs of diesel oil for the Dung Quat oil refinery plant to 7 per cent by this year end to solve difficulties in business of the plant.

Ngo Minh Hai, deputy head of the Club of State-owned Enterprises under the Central Institute of Economic Management, said the Government should consider carefully preferential policies and support for oil refinery projects.

The Government should tighten preferential policies for the oil refinery projects because now, the nation has many oil refinery projects, and that would promote competitiveness between the oil refineries, he said.

Nguyen Mai, chairman of the Association of Foreign Invested Enterprises, said the Government should reconsider development of the oil refinery industry and give other industries such as electronic and micro-biological industries the chance to develop.

Luu Bich Ho, former head of the Development Strategic Institute under the Ministry of Planning and Investment, said the Government should not extend preferential policies to oil refinery plants to improve their competitive ability, and restructure the oil refinery industry.