On August 11, Vice Chairman of Lao Cai Provincial People's Committee Nguyen Thanh Sinh chaired a conference to remove difficulties and obstacles for businesses exploiting and processing copper, iron and apatite minerals in the area.
Attending the conference were leaders of departments, branches, and localities, along with representatives of many businesses operating in the field of mineral exploitation and processing.
According to the Department of Agriculture and Environment, the whole province currently has 10 iron ore processing plants with a total designed capacity of about 4.96 million tons of ore/year.
Currently, only 2 factories are operating with unstable capacity, reaching about 300,000 tons/year, while the remaining 8 factories are temporarily suspended to adjust technology and equipment.
In the field of deep processing, Lao Cai has 18 chemical and mineral processing plants, producing items such as sulfuric acid, yellow phosphorus, DAP, phosphate fertilizer, phosphoric acid...
However, the raw material demand of factories is very large, while the supply capacity in 2026 is still limited. Some businesses are facing the risk of production disruption due to a lack of stable ore sources.
Faced with the above situation, the Vice Chairman of Lao Cai Provincial People's Committee requested departments and agencies to review all mineral exploitation projects in the area, specifically assess which projects are being exploited at the correct capacity, which projects are operating below capacity or have not been implemented, and clarify the causes to have appropriate solutions to remove obstacles.
Mr. Nguyen Thanh Sinh emphasized that the resolution of difficulties must go into substance, where there are problems, handle them immediately, avoiding the situation where businesses have to work with many agencies but the problem still drags on. Units need to clearly define responsibilities, focal points and handling deadlines for each proposal.
One of the major "bottlenecks" pointed out is land procedures. According to the Department of Agriculture and Environment, many apatite, copper and iron mining projects have not yet been allocated land or have only been allocated a part of the area, causing project implementation to be delayed.
Issues related to mineral planning, exploration work, forest use conversion, exploitation and processing technology also need to be further reviewed and adjusted to suit reality.
Representatives of the Department of Industry and Trade said that, along with removing difficulties in exploitation, businesses need to promote innovation in screening and processing technology, especially for low-content ore types, in order to improve resource efficiency and increase product value.
At the conference, representatives of Viet Trung Mineral and Metallurgy Co., Ltd. requested the province to support completing procedures to open a gate connecting to road 182, creating favorable conditions for mineral transportation, and at the same time accelerating procedures related to the Quy Xa mine to ensure raw material sources for steel billet production.
Meanwhile, Duc Giang Chemical Joint Stock Company proposed to remove difficulties in raw material sources, transportation costs, energy prices, land procedures as well as issues related to the environment and landfills in the project implementation process.
Concluding the conference, the Vice Chairman of Lao Cai Provincial People's Committee requested departments and branches to strongly shift from "guiding" thinking to proactively coordinating to resolve each specific case.
The Department of Agriculture and Environment is assigned to preside over and coordinate with the Department of Finance, Department of Industry and Trade, Department of Construction and related units to summarize all difficulties of each project, classify them by group of issues, and clearly identify the responsible agency and completion time.
