Hanoi (VNA)༺ – Hanoi has disbursed a total of 28.1 trillion VND (1.15 billion USD) of investment capital sourced from the State budget in the first eight months of 2023, equal to 54.5% of the yearly plan and up 0.8% year-on-year (yoy), according to municipal People’s Committee.

Of the total, the capital managed by the municipal administration was 11.7 trillion VND, equivalent to 51.6% of the plan for the whole year, and down 0.5% yoy; 15.3 trillion VND was managed by districts, representing an increase of 1.9% from the same period last year and the remainder was managed by communes. The municipal People’s Committee has demanded the People’s Committees of districts to take drastic actions to speed up the implementation of key projects, including the Nhon-Hanoi Station metro project which has a total length of 12.5km and a total investment of 32.9 trillion VND. Up to now, 77% of the workload has been completed. The second-phase Vinh Tuy bridge project, which was started in January 2021 at a cost of 2.5 trillion VND, was put into operation on August 30, four months ahead of schedule. The second-phase bridge, which runs parallel with the first-phase bridge, is expected to help ease traffic congestion and facilitate traveling between the two banks of the Red River, meeting the rising transport demand between the capital's downtown and its northern and northeastern regions. Launched in June this year, Belt Road No 4, which has a length of 112.8km, runs through Hanoi city and Hung Yen and Bac Ninh provinces. It will begin at the start of the Noi Bai – Lao Cai Expressway in Hanoi, and end on the Noi Bai – Ha Long Expressway in Bac Ninh province. The project has total investment of 85.8 trillion VND and is expected to be completed in 2027. Hoang Cau-Voi Phuc stretch of Belt Road No. 1, which has a length of 2.2km and a width of 50m, starts from Cat Linh-La Thanh-Yen Lang crossroads and ends at Voi Phuc intersection. The total investment capital of the project was estimated at 7.2 trillion VND in the first phase. So far, 20.1% of the project’s disbursement has been completed. Besides the State budget capital, Hanoi has created favourable conditions to attract more investment, especially foreign direct investment (FDI). According to the municipal Statistics Office, Hanoi attracted 2.34 billion USD of FDI in the first eight months of this year, with 262 new projects worth 120 million USD and 116 projects permitted to increase investment capital by 197 million USD. A total of 225 foreign investors contributed capital and bought shares worth 2.02 billion USD in the reviewed period. Japanese investor Sumitomo bought shares of VPBank with a transaction value of 1.5 billion USD. The FDI inflows increased 2.89 times against the same period last year, making the city the best performer in this regard in Vietnam during the eight months. Vietnam lured close to 18.15 billion USD in FDI from the beginning of this year to August 20, up 8.2% year on year, according to the Foreign Investment Agency under the Ministry of Planning and Investment./.