Mining capacity is still limited
According to Project Management Board 2 - Investor of Component 4 of Chau Doc - Can Tho - Soc Trang Expressway Project, the section passing through Soc Trang province (referred to as the Project) - in the province there are 2 commercial river sand mines (MS01, MS04). These 2 mines have reserves of 5.44 million m3 but have only exploited about 167,000 m3. According to the plan, by June 2025, these two mines will supply a maximum of 0.698 million m3 to the Project.
For river sand mines directly assigned to contractors, the enterprise has completed exploitation procedures at 6 mines. 2/6 mines (MS03, MS12) meet the exploitation conditions; the remaining 4 mines do not meet the exploitation conditions. According to the plan, the 2 mines currently in operation are expected to supply a maximum of 1.094 million m3 to the Project by June 2025.
According to the records, the 4 mines (MS01, MS03, MS04, MS12) have a total reserve of about 6.5 million m3, basically meeting the requirements for the Project. However, due to the control of exploitation capacity, the total of these 4 mines will exploit to the maximum by June 2025, reaching about 1.8 million cubic meters, meeting 27% of the demand volume, lacking about 4.8 million m3. In addition, the volume of sand from MS04 mine must be shared for the Dai Ngai bridge project, so the volume of sand may not be met, the risk of not ensuring the time milestones is very high.
Mr. Thach Minh Hoai - Director of Project Management Board 2 - proposed that the People's Committee of Soc Trang province direct the Department of Natural Resources and Environment to review sand mines that can supply the Project; consider increasing the capacity of 2 commercial sand mines (MS01, MS04); Speed up and complete procedures according to regulations to soon put MS11 river sand mine into operation.
Each sand mine has a price.
According to Project Management Board 2, each sand mine currently has a different price announcement. Mine MS01 is proposing to increase from 81,950 VND/m3 to 132,593 VND/m3 (including VAT). Mine MS03 and MS04, the enterprise proposes to provisionally calculate the unit price using a suction vessel at 136,876 VND/m3. As for mine MS12, the proposed provisional price using a scraper is 132,260 VND/m3.
The leader of Project Management Board 2 said that the fact that each mine has a different price announcement, based on the provisional estimate of the mine owner, causes difficulties in management and operation. Currently, the construction unit only focuses on buying sand from the mine with the lowest price announcement because of concerns that buying from the mine with a higher price is not enough to pay the investor.
For the current mining volume, it is an estimated volume, and cannot be confirmed to be exactly the same as the assessed reserves, while many costs have not been determined (environmental restoration costs, landslide treatment, mine closure), so the official price cannot be determined.
The representative of Project Management Board 2 proposed that the People's Committee of Soc Trang province direct relevant departments, branches and commercial sand mine owners to promptly determine and announce prices at the mine as a basis for payment according to regulations.
Regarding this issue, Chairman of Soc Trang Provincial People's Committee Tran Van Lau requested departments, branches, investors, and sand mine owners to promptly determine and announce prices at the mines as a basis for payment according to regulations; so that contractors can proactively take sand to the construction site, contributing to speeding up the project's progress.
The Chairman of the People's Committee of Soc Trang province said that time is limited, if the amount of sand is exploited continuously, it will not ensure the reserve for the project. Therefore, the relevant units should review the mines that are capable of supplying sand for the project, ensure the sand reserve for the project, and ensure the construction progress.
