RESEARCH FOR TRANSFERRING 2% INTEREST INTEREST PACKAGE TO SOCIAL HOUSE LOANS

The Government requested the State Bank to consider switching the 2% interest rate support package in the economic recovery program to social housing loans.

According to Resolution 30 of the National Assembly on the economic recovery program, the banking industry is assigned to deploy a 2% interest rate support package of VND 40,000 billion for loans to businesses, cooperatives, and business households for two years. 2022 - 2023.

The updated report of the Ministry of Planning and Investment said that after more than a year of implementing this package, only 134 billion VND was disbursed until the end of February 2023, which is nearly 0.34% of the total package size. It is expected that this year this package will disburse an additional VND 2,345 billion, with the remaining VND 37,521 billion not being spent.

At the announcement of the Government Standing Committees conclusion on the socio-economic situation in February and the implementation of the economic recovery program, the Government assigned the State Bank to carefully evaluate the disbursement ability, and propose a plan to transfer funds to the State Bank of Vietnam. paying interest rate support to other forms and policies. One of the options considered is switching to social housing loans.

Mr. Nguyen Manh Hung, a Standing Member of the Economic Committee, commented that this is a solution to be considered in the context that the disbursement of the 2% interest rate support package has been "blocked" recently, but he is concerned about its feasibility.

Because, according to Resolution 30 of the National Assembly, policy changes related to the economic recovery program will need to be reported and consulted with the National Assembly while the implementation time is only until 2023. The book is long while the remaining time to implement the support package is not much, 9 months left.

Not to mention, the two policies have skewed objects and support interest rates, so they are also "not easy to convert". And currently, the interest rate for social housing loans is 5% a year, but the disbursement is very slow. In Ho Chi Minh City, less than 2% of people in need of loans can borrow capital for social housing, according to leaders of Ho Chi Minh Citys Department of Construction.

"The supply of social housing is currently not abundant, development policy is entangled with many regulations, so if the government invests capital to lend to this sector, the authorities need to calculate carefully to avoid the recurrence of disbursement congestion. ", he noted.

Mr. Hung acknowledged that the main problem of the 2% interest rate support package is the procedure, the fear of the borrower, and the fear of the responsibility of the lender - commercial banks.

This fact is also reflected in the State Banks response to the Binh Thuan voters petition. This agency cited the reason that the disbursed interest rate support package was so low that the economic context was different from when it was proposed to develop an economic recovery program.

On the other hand, both borrowers and lenders are not interested. "The fear of customers and commercial banks with the inspection and audit procedures in the future, as well as apprehension when assessing the resilience of customers", the State Bank said.

According to the actual survey from commercial banks, 67% of customers are eligible to borrow but they say they do not want to borrow the interest rate support package.

Another problem is that the loan conditions for customers are too strict, such as the requirement to assess the "resilient" loan business and household. However, the State Bank said that there is a plan to handle and amend regulations and the banking industry is still determined to implement the above support package.

If the policy bottleneck is cleared, experts expect the 2% interest rate support package will disburse better. In the context of economic growth slowing down, inflation is likely to increase, causing businesses to urgently need capital.