VietNamNet Bridge - Mining companies are complaining that the amount of money they have to pay to get  mining rights is unreasonable. 

Under the 2010 Mineral Law and guiding documents released three years later, mining companies have to pay a mining right granting fee. This is one of 15 kinds of taxes and fees miners pay to local budgets.

The amount of money enterprises pay is calculated based on the estimated reserves of mines.

An expert said if enterprises pay enough taxes every year, the revenue of northwestern mountainous provinces would have hundreds of billions of dong more from the mining right granting fees.

The problem is that the fee is based on the estimated reserves, while the reports about reserves, in most cases, are wrong.

A VCCI (Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry) report on legal compliance in the mining field released in 2016 pointed out that in the past, when there was no regulation on mining right granting fees, the report about reserves did not have much significance. Miners tended to report that reserves were higher than they estimated.  

“It would be okay if the exploitation output is lower than reported reserves. But if the output is higher, a heavy fire is imposed,” the report said. 

There was another reason, which prompted miners to declare that reserves were higher than in reality: they could easily access bank loans if they exploited mines with high reserves.

However, enterprises have been asked to pay the mining right granting fee. And now they want to report lower reserves to be able to reduce the amount of money they have to pay.

As the fee is too heavy, some have been deliberately delaying the payment and others have asked to lower the reported mines’ reserves, while some have asked to pay the fee based on the actual output instead of reserves.

MONRE (the Ministry of Natural Resources and the Environment) has decided to save enterprises. In a draft legal document, the ministry mentions the ‘re-calculation of mine reserves’.

The draft document says if the real reserves are higher or lower by more than 30 percent than the reserves approved by the state management agency, miners will have to report this for re-approval. 

However, the proposal has stirred controversy. While some analysts think this will reduce risks for miners, others argue that the adjustment of the mine reserves is not stipulated in the Mineral Law. 

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Thanh Lich