Deal strictly with land speculation: Party chief

Closing the six-day fifth plenum of 13th Party Central Committee in Hanoi Tuesday, Trong said the committee, the highest authority within the Communist Party of Vietnam, has spent a lot of time researching, discussing, and unanimously promulgating a new resolution on continuing to innovate and complete institutions and policies; improve effectiveness and efficiency of land management and use; and create a driving force for Vietnam to become a high-income developed nation.

The committee reaffirmed that land belongs to the people, and the state represents the owner in managing it.

The state recovers land to use for defense and security purposes, serving national and public interests, and socio-economic development projects in line with the law, ensuring fairness and transparency, Trong said.

Therefore, land management and use must ensure common interests of the people, he added.

People should be given favorable conditions to access and use land fairly, effectively and sustainably. The state has to uniformly manage land in terms of economic, cultural, national defense, security and environmental values; ensuring reasonable assignment between central management agencies and local authorities.

Land use right is the right to use a particular type of property, and is not ownership, the Party chief stressed.

Land use rights and properties attached to land are protected by law. Land users have rights and obligations as prescribed by law, he said.

The state does not recognize the reclaiming of land that it has allocated to other organizations and individuals for use in the course of implementing policies and laws, or raise the issue of adjusting agricultural land that has been allocated to households and individuals. The state must have policies for agricultural land to be used most efficiently, Trong said.

Institutions and policies on land must be completed synchronously and “in line with socialist-oriented market economic development,” he added.

“Those in charge must resolutely overcome the practice of land speculation and improper land use, wastefulness and corruption that upsets the public,” he stressed.

Land must be fully investigated, assessed, inventoried, quantified and accounted for, its rational use properly planned with a long-term vision that harmonizes interests between generations, regions, between central and local governments, and between socio-economic development and assurance of national defense and security.

Furthermore, land use planning must also ensure environmental protection and climate change adaptation, as well as national food security, Trong said.

He said inadequacies and problems in land management and use left by history and new requirements have to be resolved.

The committee unanimously agreed to amend and supplement the 2013 Land Law and related regulations to overcome long-standing limitations and weaknesses, especially those related to land use planning, land allocation, price determination, the system of management and use of agricultural land, land derived from state-owned agricultural and forestry farms, and land for worship.

The Central Committee agreed on the need to set up a Provincial Steering Committee on anti-corruption, considering it “necessary, correct and in line with reality,” the Party chief said.

At the plenum, the committee received a thematic report on the Russia-Ukraine conflict covering international impacts and other issues.

The committee asked related units to continue to closely monitor the situation and forecast possible scenarios in order to have a response plan and minimize negative impacts, in the spirit of “Vietnam willing to be a friend and a reliable and responsible partner of all countries in the international community.”