The draft revised Land Law has just been announced by the Ministry of Agriculture and Environment for comments until the end of August 10. In the submission, the Ministry said that after nearly two years of implementation, the 2024 Land Law still has some limitations, and it is necessary to continue to study and improve policies to unlock land resources to serve socio-economic development.
According to the Ministry of Agriculture and Environment, in practice, some inadequacies have arisen, especially the situation of taking advantage of the absence of land acquisition decisions to carry out transactions and land fluctuations in order to profit from compensation, support, and resettlement policies; complicating the work of identifying compensation beneficiaries, prolonging site clearance time, arising complaints and disputes, and causing difficulties for state management of land.
Along with that, the 2024 Land Law stipulates that subjects eligible for training, vocational conversion and job search support when the State recovers land will be supported with an amount of money not exceeding 5 times the land price in the land price list must meet the condition that they are households or individuals directly engaged in agricultural production (with income from agricultural production on that land), leading to difficulties in identifying direct agricultural production subjects to be supported, on the other hand, this regulation is not yet suitable for cases arising in reality such as no income from agricultural production due to objective reasons... leading to slowing down site clearance for investment projects.
In the Draft Land Law (amended), the Ministry of Agriculture and Environment proposed to allow land recovery before approving compensation, support, and resettlement plans and land recovery before completing resettlement arrangement for some specific projects to accelerate project implementation and soon put land into use.
Supplementing regulations on compensation, support, and resettlement for land users who have received land use rights transfers during the time of implementing land recovery notices to prevent policy fraud, speculation in compensation, and illegal construction after receiving land recovery notices.
Legalizing the principle that people whose land is recovered must have housing and living conditions equal to or better than their old housing by factors that can be checked such as housing, infrastructure, livelihoods, jobs, income, schools, health, transportation, public services and people's satisfaction.
Supplementing cases of land recovery for the remaining area of land plots after recovery that are not eligible for use and land users requesting recovery.
Assigning local authorities to issue special support policies when the State recovers land to implement nationally important projects, urgent projects with large-scale land recovery, affecting many land users, property owners, recovered land with complex origins may be different from the provisions of the Land Law.
Amending and supplementing the basis for land recovery for national defense and security purposes; socio-economic development for national and public interests according to commune-level land use plans, except for projects that have been decided on investment policies and investment decisions by the National Assembly, Government, Ministries, sectors, and Provincial People's Councils.
Removing the condition of having a stable income from agricultural production of individuals directly engaged in agricultural production who are supported with training, vocational conversion and job search in cash not exceeding 5 times the land price in the land price list; specifically stipulating that individuals directly engaged in agricultural production are supported for convenience and uniformity in implementation.
According to the Ministry of Agriculture and Environment, this amendment aims to create strong momentum for infrastructure development, attract investment and effectively exploit land resources, contributing to the implementation of national development goals; ensuring harmony of interests, reducing lawsuits, stabilizing the lives of people whose land is recovered and accelerating project implementation progress, preventing policy profiteering, compensation speculation, and illegal construction after land recovery notices are issued.
