Poor administration leads to budget overspending By Nguyen Hien   NA deputies discussed the wasteful management that is rampant among local state agencies and departments.    Individuals take advantages of abandoned land for businesses Minister of Finance Dinh Tien Dung reported to the NA on the topic on June 5. According to the report, weak management is rife, leading to chronic overspending. Several agencies have also used their budgets for the wrong purposes. In 2010, 3,386 projects were behind schedule and 221 projects violated regulations on investment. In addition, the management of land and headquarters is ignored and large amounts of land remain idle. During the first eight months of 2012, most of the firms were revealed to have committed violations such as sham tendering, overspending on contractors. State-owned firms also seem unaware about how to cut costs. The Vietnam National Petroleum Group incurred huge losses in 2011, Petrovietnam Construction Corporation showed little business efficiency and Saigon Industry Corporation used its land ineffectively. "Firms often expand business despite their limited management and financial capacity. This has resulted in many losses over the years." the report said. Waste in the healthcare and education sectors were also discussed with problems such as medical facilities equipped with modern technology being wasted as they do not have capable personnel to use the machines. The report suggested drafting specific regulations to the two sectors. Overspending needs to be addressed and the report proposed to assign specific responsibility to the agencies. For example, the Ministry of Planning and Investment will take full responsibility for planning evaluation, investment guidelines and the Ministry of Construction is responsible for issuing building permits and price lists. The NA Finance and Budget Committee said that most overspending was the results of decisions to invest in ineffective projects or to make investment without considering the financial and social factors. That's why penalties and the responsibilities of the leaders of state agencies needed to be outlined. Dantri International (dtinews.vn)