Deputies of the HCMC People’s Council have voiced concerns that the city lacks proper policies to attract investments in science and technology.

Deputy Thai Tuan Chi told a meeting of the council on December 10 that the city has a master scientific and technological plan towards 2025 but many enterprises do not know anything about this plan.

Many enterprises want to buy modern machinery and equipment to produce value-added products but they are not sure of the city’s supporting policies for this area. Meanwhile, the current policies are not attractive enough to woo investments to the key sectors in the city and products with added value.

Meanwhile, the operating cost of businesses in HCMC is higher than other localities due to infrastructure bottlenecks and complicated administrative procedures. These are barriers for enterprises to improve their competitiveness.

“The city is losing its advantage as a destination for seaports and airport and industries with high added value, and human resources for the city’s key sectors remain limited. These major issues need to be analyzed,” Chi said.

Deputy Tran Quang Thang pointed out another problem of HCMC as he said oil and gas revenues account for US$10.8 billion of the city’s gross domestic product (GDP), or 26%. With such a proportion, the city’s GDP would be affected in case of natural disasters or oil supply disruptions.

Therefore, Thang urged the city government to think of viable measures to obtain sustainable development, instead of heavily depending on oil and gas resources.

Deputy Tu Minh Thien told the Daily on the sidelines of the meeting that the city’s growth is mainly contributed by foreign direct investment (FDI) enterprises. Nevertheless, sustainable development requires growth of domestic companies, especially small- and medium-sized enterprises. This is an important factor to develop supporting industries in the city.

The HCMC People’s Committee admitted in its report presented at the meeting that SMEs are still grappling with difficulties, outsourced products account for a majority of exports, and the city lacks strategic products.

SGT/VNN