HCMC – The Ministry of Transport has agreed to reschedule the completion date of the Vinh Hao-Phan Thiet expressway project, which will run through Binh Thuan Province, to June 30 this year, two months later than previously planned.

The ministry’s Project Management Unit 7, the project’s investor, announced the extension on March 14, the local media reported.

Deputy Minister of Transport Nguyen Danh Huy on March 9 approved a proposal of Project Management Unit 7 and the Transport Construction Investment Management Authority to push back the project’s completion date.

The Transport Ministry told Project Management Unit 7 to review and complete necessary procedures for the project execution under the prevailing regulations.

The Transport Construction Investment Management Authority was tasked with monitoring and making weekly reports on the project’s progress, and proposing measures for tackling units that fail to complete their construction packages as planned.

The Vinh Hao-Phan Thiet expressway project, part of the country’s big-ticket North-South expressway project, was originally scheduled for completion on April 30 this year, but it lacked nearly 90,000 cubic meters of sand for backfilling. Meanwhile, the licenses of all the sand mines in the province serving the project’s development have expired.

Therefore, the Government’s Resolution 31, released on March 7 this year, allowed the People’s Committee of Binh Thuan Province to consider and renew sand mining licenses for six sand mines which serve the construction of the route without a need to conduct investment procedures and environmental impact assessment.

On March 13, the provincial authorities worked with the project’s contractors and sand mine owners, asking the involved parties to complete procedures to renew these sand mining licenses.