On December 15, Mr. Nguyen Ngoc Hung - Director of the Ben Hai River Basin Protection Forest Management Board (Quang Tri province) confirmed that it is not yet possible to liquidate the natural forest area where the project of the road connecting the Ho Chi Minh Highway East branch with the Ho Chi Minh Highway West branch will pass through.
“After completing the procedures for liquidating the natural forest area to build a traffic project, the auction company held two auctions, but still no customers participated,” said Mr. Nguyen Ngoc Hung.
The slow clearance of forest area has led to the slow progress of the above-mentioned road project, so the Ben Hai River Basin Protective Forest Management Board has reported to the People's Committee of Quang Tri province.
Mr. Ha Sy Dong - Acting Chairman of Quang Tri Provincial People's Committee said that he has assigned the Department of Finance, Department of Agriculture and Rural Development and other units to urgently advise on the liquidation of forest areas related to the construction of the traffic project.
After receiving instructions from the People's Committee of Quang Tri province, relevant units held a meeting and agreed to consider rebuilding the starting price of the liquidated forest lot to attract interested customers.
It is known that the starting price for the natural forest wood lot is nearly 5.9 billion VND. The reason why there are no customers interested in the auction is said to be because this natural forest wood lot is not distributed in a concentrated manner (total area of more than 14 hectares), but extends 4.5 km along the route that will be built through the forest. In order to exploit the natural forest trees, transporting the wood is also difficult because there are currently no roads.
Previously, Lao Dong Newspaper reported that the project to connect the East branch of Ho Chi Minh Road with the West branch of Ho Chi Minh Road will be implemented from 2022, with a length of 15km. To date, more than 10.5km has been basically completed, the remaining 4.5km has not been handed over because it passes through natural forests. To have a site to implement the project, Quang Tri converted the area of natural forests and was approved by the Prime Minister on November 24, 2023. After that, the converted forest area was auctioned, but there were no customers participating.
