Making Vung Ang an international logistics center

Making Vung Ang an international logistics center

Focusing on building infrastructure

To promote its advantages and meet the needs for developments, the People’s Committee of Ha Tinh Province has issued a decision approving the detailed planning project to build a logistics center in Vung Ang Economic Zone, Ha Tinh.

The logistics center in Vung Ang Economic Zone was planned to be the Class 1 Logistics Center, serving provincial, regional and international logistics activities, improving provincial competition abilities and bringing Ha Tinh economy to integrate with global economy. This will be a cargo consolidation point to economic zones and industrial zones in Ha Tinh and Nothern Quang Binh area, and then, to have them transported by sea to regional large transshipment ports as Hong Kong (China) and Singapore; by road (National Road 8 and National Road 12C) to Laos and Northeastern provinces in Thailand.

This is also a basis that attracts enterprises to invest in, to do business and to exploit the logistics center in Vung Ang Economic Zone and to promote activities and developments of Vung Ang- Son Duong port group, to develop the logistics service sector in Ha Tinh and to assist other sectors of industry, trade and services in Ha Tinh to develop.

Le Trung Phuoc, Head of Vung Ang Economic Zone said: “The province has approved the detailed plan of Vung Ang Logistics Center of 130ha and has submitted the plan of Son Duong Logistics of about 25ha for approval. Currently, we are improving the plan to develop Vung Ang Economic Zone to be an economic motive force for sustainable development of the province”.

Vung Ang, according to Phuoc, has better competition abilities than other economic zones thanks to the deepwater seaport of Vung Ang - Son Duong. The port is enable to receive vessels of 50,000 - 300,000DWT. In the future, it will be designed to receive vessels of 500,000DWT - a special advantage to large investors investing in the Economic Zone.

In the meeting session with Ha Tinh Province in November 2020, Deputy Minister of the Ministry of Transport Nguyen Nhat said the sea region of Vung AngSon Duong of Ha Tinh has an ideal depth to develop sea ports. The construction and development of seaport and the logistics areas will be premises for calling investment in steel industry and assisting industry in Vung Ang Economic Zone. In the other word, there should be synchronous investments in the seaport infrastructure and logistics area in order to develop Vung Ang Economic Zone.

So far, Ha Tinh has been focusing on mobilizing resources for investment in seaport infrastructure: Lao-Viet Port, Hoanh Son, Vingroup…, transport infrastructure and warehouses… At the same time, the construction of Vung Ang port breakwater will be given priority to use the medium-term capital source. As planned, the Northern breakwater has the length of 370 meters long; the Western one, 1.850 meters long, representatives of Ha Tinh Provincial Management Board of the Economic Zone confirmed.

To receive cargo from seaports of Vung Ang, Cua Lo to Laos and Thailand, Ha Tinh has been investing in an ICD in the area of Cau Treo International Gateway. Accordingly, an ICD of 5-10ha will be built in the period of 2021-2025 with the throughput capacity of 13,500- 27,000TEU pa.

Going to the far seas

According to Ha Tinh Port Authority, one of the factors contributing to logistics development is opening container routes in Vung Ang port area. To ensure the infrastructure as well as the berths to receive large container vessels, since 2016, the Ha Tinh Port Authority has coordinated with enterprises to proactively propose to Vietnam Maritime Administration to allow additional functions for the ports: Vung Ang area port can receive container vessels. Currently, Vietnam Maritime Administration allowed berth 1 to receive container ships of up to 30,000 DWT, and berth 2 to receive container ships of up to 45,000 DWT. This is an important step in infrastructure preparation to handle container vessels at the ports.

According to Ha Tinh Port Authority, one of the factors contributing to logistics development is opening container routes in Vung Ang port area

The advantages of Vung Ang - Son Duong port group have caught the eyes of many domestic and foreign investors such as Xiamen Port Group (China), Formosa Group (Taiwan), Singapore Seaport Group and Saigon Newport Corporation.

On January 14, 2021, a memorandum of understanding on cooperation between Saigon Newport Corporation and Ha Tinh Provincial People’s Committee was signed, marking a milestone for cooperation to form and develop seaport and logistics in Vung Ang, Ha Tinh.

Then, on April 10, 2021, Laos - Vietnam International Port JSC. welcomed the first container ship docked at Vung Ang Port- an event that marks a good start in the cooperation between Laos - Vietnam International Port JSC. and Saigon New Port Corp. And since, there have been 7 ships docking at the port from the container route of 4 times/ month between Hai Phong - Ha Tinh - HCMC and vice versa.

According to statistics by Ha Tinh Port Authority, from the beginning of 2021, cargo throughput through the seaports has reached over 17.8m tons- an increase of 11.9% year-over-year in 2020, in which exported goods reached over 3.3m tons; imported goods reached over 9m tons; domestic goods reached 5.5 tons.

It is expected in 2021, the amount of cargo throughput in the seaports in Ha Tinh will reach 35m tons (an increase of 3m tons compared to that of 2020) with over 4,000 vessels (an increase of 400 vessels compared to that of 2020).