Informing Lao Dong Newspaper on April 20, the Vietnam Road Administration said that the unit has just reported to the Ministry of Construction on the impact of gasoline and oil price fluctuations on road construction and maintenance investment projects.
The Road Administration believes that the military conflict in the Middle East region puts great pressure on fuel prices. From the beginning of March 2026 to now, world crude oil prices have increased sharply, leading to many domestic price adjustments. Gasoline increased by about 15%, diesel oil increased by about 70%, asphalt increased by about 31.77% compared to the end of February. In the context of potential prolonged conflict, crude oil prices are forecast to remain at 100-120 USD per barrel.
The Road Administration forecasts that in the short term, fuel and material prices will continue to be high, and may even be locally scarce, directly affecting the progress of construction and repair packages.
For public investment projects invested by the Road Administration, price fluctuations have had a clear impact. At the project to renovate and upgrade National Highway 14E (Quang Nam), the asphalt concrete pavement construction package was greatly affected when costs increased by about 25% due to material prices escalating.
Meanwhile, the project to renovate and upgrade National Highway 28B through Binh Thuan and Lam Dong recorded a total cost increase of about 56.422 billion VND due to fluctuations in fuel prices. However, due to the application of contracts according to adjusted unit prices and still having contingency costs, the project is assessed to be able to ensure completion without exceeding the total investment.
Greater pressure is concentrated in road maintenance projects in 2026. According to the review, if material prices are updated at the beginning of April, the total cost of maintenance packages may increase from 3,294 billion VND to 4,240 billion VND, equivalent to an increase of 28.7%. Due to the specific nature of these projects mainly related to repairing asphalt concrete pavement, they are directly affected by gasoline and asphalt prices.
Notably, maintenance packages currently mainly apply fixed unit price contracts. In the context of sharply increasing input costs, if construction continues, contractors are at risk of suffering great losses.
Therefore, there has been a situation where some contractors have delayed implementation, leading to the risk of delays, affecting traffic safety and project safety, and at the same time affecting the capital disbursement plan for 2026.
Faced with this situation, the Road Administration said that it has implemented a number of solutions such as working with contractors to adjust construction plans, prioritizing items that are less affected by price fluctuations.
For packages that have not been signed contracts or have not been bid, management agencies will adjust package prices and apply more appropriate contract forms.
However, handling still faces obstacles due to legal regulations on adjusting fixed unit price contracts not being consistent between relevant laws, while new guiding documents have not been issued.
Therefore, the Road Administration proposed that the Ministry of Construction report to competent authorities for consideration and supplementation of regulations to create a legal basis for adjusting contracts in the context of strong fluctuations in fuel and material prices.
