Hanoi (VNA)💎 – Airports with poor performances will be removed from the freshly-approved master planning project on national airport development for the 2021-2030 period, with a vision to 2050, Director of the Civil Aviation Authority of Vietnam (CAAV) Dinh Viet Thang has said.

Thang had an interview with a reporter of VietnamPlus e-newspaper under the Vietnam News Agency (VNA) on the sidelines of a conference to announce the master planning project on July 14.

Reporter: How do you evaluate the master planning project on national airport development for the 2021-2030 period, with a vision to 2050?

CAAV Director Dinh Viet Thang:𝄹 Air transport plays an important role in the overall national transport system, and this mode of transport plays a very important role in the socio-economic development of regions and the whole country in general.

With the role of boosting socio-economic development and ensuring national security, in this planning project, the Prime Minister approved and set new orientations such as maximising the mobilisation of airport infrastructure, including civil airports, for dual-use operations (both civil and military purposes). The approved planning project this time is highly open and introduces the principles of adding new airports and removing those with poor performances from the planning project. In particular, in this planning project, the Ministry of Transport does not have a fixed limit on the number of airports, it is only an orientation. Depending on socio-economic development demand and capabilities of localities, the need to ensure national defence and rescue missions, it is allowed to add new locations and new airports to the planning projects of localities; in which three criteria must be met, including demand, locations able to develop airports and airfields, and preparation of investment resources to ensure efficient operation of airports.

Reporter: The total investment in airport development by 2030 is expected to hit 420 trillion VND (17.7 billion USD). So how do you evaluate the mobilisation of resources to pour capital into airport infrastructure?

CAAV Director Dinh Viet Thang: 🌜The Civil Aviation Authority of Vietnam is aware of difficulties, obstacles, and things that have not been done before, especially in mobilising social resources and removing obstacles in terms of mechanisms and policies. However, in the Prime Minister's decision approving the planning project, there are important orientations for ministries and sectors to propose and advise the Prime Minister and the National Assembly to promulgate regulations, especially legal regulations, to create conditions for the development of the airport system, between aviation and national defence as they share property and land.

Airports are the national transport infrastructure whose main goal is to serve people's travel. Therefore, the efficiency of airports is the overall efficiency of the country, society, businesses and people. This problem is also common in the world, as not all airports are profitable, but there are airport locations indispensably required to serve socio-economic development goals. The problem is how to organise the airport network to gain profits and ensure development. The Civil Aviation Authority of Vietnam has affirmed that airports should not be approached individually, which is a consistent view throughout the development of airports. Regarding the organisation of the airport system, in my opinion, it is necessary to decentralise in accordance with key airports, gateways or localities. For example, even in the US, there are only more than 10 converging airports, they are organised in the form of an “axis with spokes” that means routes are all through these centres, thereby ensuring the efficient exploitation as well as cheap prices for passengers. Vietnam has Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City regions, in which Long Thanh International Airport will have the most important role in the southern region.

Reporter: Recently, localities have massively applied for planning and investment in airports. In your opinion, will this situation break the planning when the airports are too close together?

CAAV Director Dinh Viet Thang:𒊎 The desire to have airports of localities is legitimate because airports play an important role in socio-economic development.

However, I affirm that an airport is only a necessary but not a sufficient condition for the socio-economic development of the locality. On the other hand, the structure of airports depends on many factors such as the needs of socio-economic development of regions in the country; the relationship between air vehicles and other modes of transport, on the principle of harmonious development and reasonable allocation for concerted development and mutual support of all types of vehicles. The third is efficiency. This is an important issue when asking if localities should have an airport and at what time, because airports have large investment resources and costs to maintain and develop. In addition to bringing common benefits, it is still necessary to ensure certain efficiency to maintain and develop, to avoid the situation that the airport is built and then stops operating. In this planning project, the Prime Minister has the view of “both close and open”. Specifically, any airport that does not promote its role will be taken out of the planning project. As for the airport that has needs, ensures efficiency, arranges investment resources, it will be included in the planning project. Reporter: Thank you very much!