Officials introduce tax policies at a tax office. Several major improvements in the ease of doing business in Vietnam are recently made – PHOTO: VPG

The MPI and the Government Office, together with the relevant ministries and agencies, have met with a group of WB experts in charge of the Doing Business report to update them on the progress of Vietnam’s business environment reforms, reported the Government news website.

The WB experts will issue their assessments on the effectiveness and quality of the business reforms for the 2020 edition of the report, which will be released in October this year.

The average time needed to start a business is expected to be halved to eight days from the current 17, and the number of relevant procedures will also be cut from eight to five steps.

The MPI has already instructed business registration offices to simplify administrative procedures by the processes for merging business establishment registrations, issuing notifications of seal samples, seal engraving and opening bank accounts into one procedural step.

Also, the Ministry of Finance has issued a circular reducing the time needed for the registration of self-printing invoices from 10 days to two days.

Meanwhile, the Dealing with Construction Permits indicator will drop from 10 steps over 166 days to 52 days.

The decline is attributed to the fact that the Ministry of Construction has coordinated with the Ministry of Public Security and local water supply and drainage firms to complete three procedures – the appraisal and approval of fire protection and fire fighting designs, the issuance of construction permits and the connection of water supply and drainage systems.

This is also partly thanks to other reforms, such as decentralizing the issuance of construction permits for local governments, in line with the Construction Law and the Government’s Decree 59/2015, and shortening the period of registration for asset ownership upon the completion of construction, aligned with the Government’s Decree 1/2017 on the Land Law.

With regard to tax and social insurance payments, the Ministry of Finance has updated the statistics on firms that declare and pay their taxes online, including value-added and corporate income taxes.

The figure accounts for 90% of the total, so the number of corporate income tax payments is expected to fall to one instance from the previous five.

According to the MPI, some recent regulations have improved the effectiveness of the Trading Across Borders indicator.

For example, the Government’s Decree 59/2018 on import and export customs procedures mandates the receipt of e-invoices and sets a deadline by which customs officers must address customs declaration applications. SGT

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