Amendment of Regulations on Finalization of Investment Capital from the Budget

In fact, Circular No. 210 was issued in 2010. Over the past 6 years, ministries, central authorities, and local authorities have implemented the annual budget settlement relatively seriously; however, during the implementation process, there have been some shortcomings and discrepancies that have caused financial agencies difficulty in evaluating the settlements. Additionally, there arises a need to manage and disburse investment capital from the State Budget more strictly and effectively.

At the same time, the 2015 State Budget Law and Decree 163/2016/ND-CP of the Government of Vietnam have many new provisions regarding the settlement of investment capital from the State Budget that directly affect the regulations in Circular 210. Therefore, this Circular needs to be amended and replaced accordingly.

To be specific, regarding the forms, since the issued forms contain many unclear criteria, the understanding differs. The reporting units are still confused about aggregating data. This has led to inconsistent reporting data between the project owners, ministries, central authorities, local authorities, and the State Treasury. Hence, this content needs to be re-guided to suit the issuance of legal normative documents.

Additionally, the regulations on the timing of sending the settlement reports of the State Treasury are not appropriate. For instance, for provincial and central budgets, the State Treasury is required to aggregate, prepare, and send the annual settlement report before April 1 of the following year. However, the State Treasury needs time to aggregate and reconcile with the grassroots treasuries, so to compile the settlement report, the State Treasury often sends it 5 months later than stipulated. This affects the overall aggregation of the State Budget settlement report; thus, it needs to be amended accordingly.

Moreover, the settlement report aggregation process is inadequate due to the absence of data reconciliation between the ministries and central authorities and the central treasury before submitting the settlement report to the Ministry of Finance, resulting in data discrepancies and mismatches. Furthermore, the settlement process for foreign capital (ODA), etc., is not specific, affecting the annual budget settlement evaluation...

Due to these discrepancies mentioned above, the Ministry of Finance issued Circular No. 85 to replace it. This Circular stipulates the annual settlement of the use of investment capital from the State Budget, including preparation, submission, approval, evaluation, notification of evaluation results, and adjustment of settlement, effective from October 1, 2017, and applicable from the 2017 budget year.

Another new point is the amendment and supplementation of the evaluation process and notification of evaluation results. Circular 85 provides the order of preparation, submission, evaluation, and notification of evaluation results of the annual State Budget investment capital settlement report.

Circular 85 has added responsibilities for data reconciliation of settlement reports, requiring ministries and central authorities, before submitting the annual budget settlement report to the Ministry of Finance, to reconcile and review data with the Central Treasury, ensuring the data of the unit and the State Treasury are fully reconciled and matched.

Circular 85 also amends and replaces the entire system of forms of Circular 210, ensuring consistency in criteria, data requirements, units of measurement, etc., from the forms applied to project owners to the summarizing agencies and all levels of the State Treasury, while supplementing Form No. 05/CQTH for reconciling data between ministries and central authorities and the Central Treasury. Thus, it will contribute to minimizing the time and effort of financial agencies at all levels in data reconciliation, making it easier for units to aggregate data.

In addition, the Ministry of Finance has advanced the reporting deadlines for project owners and central ministries and authorities (project owners submit reports 1 month earlier, central ministries and authorities submit reports 2 months earlier), while pushing back the reporting deadlines of the State Treasury at all levels accordingly (provincial treasury submits reports 1.5 months later, Central Treasury submits reports 2.5 months later).

Source: Customs News

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